welcome back everybody to another chess tips video in this series i try to break
down certain concepts for you by giving you examples that you can then implement in your
own games doesn't matter whether you're a beginner intermediate or an advanced chess
player there will be something for you today we're going to talk about counter play which is
essentially a concept in chess where you try to put some pressure on your opponent from a worse
position that might mean you're down material that might mean your position is just passive
let's jump in we've got a handful of examples all from games that i've played here on chess.com the
first one actually the first two examples today are going to be about activating your pieces and
feel free to look at the video player i've broken up timestamps of what concepts are at what time
activating your pieces i had this position uh against nfm actually just a few days ago
and you'll notice that i've got a big clamp here i've got a pawn chain that's dominant
i'm completely locking down the queen side this bishop is staring into this territory but here
my opponent played the move knight g6 activating his piece now both knights eye this uh this square
and my opponent is actually up two pawns but i'm the person who for a mo for for a moment there
was going to have the better position because i had pressure on both sides of the board
and everything was locked down but now all of a sudden this is coming so here i played the move
queen c1 which supports my pawn uh and threatens to push actually if i push the pawn the queen's
just trapped because of how dominant my position is and my opponent stops my threat it's important
not to just get tunnel vision you also have to ask yourself what does your opponent want why did
he play queen c1 he wanted to push so he puts the queen right right there i play knight g3 offering
a trade of knights he brings the knight to f4 making me move away and now a question for you how
does black activate another piece you can pause if you'd like to think about it black here plays
the move bishop f6 and his intention which becomes clear in a few moves i hear him really trying to
trade pieces he brings in the second knight he plays the move bishop to g5 and now the bishop
the knight are threatening things on my queen for example this check doesn't work normally but right
now he would be opening up the bishop to the queen and that would be decisive and at this point my
opponent should have kept his focus on this side of the board something like knight h3 for example
you know just to get this bishop out of the game it's a very powerful piece it cuts the entire
board and you know for example if i play queen takes f2 here uh i've got control this way but
my opponent can even offer a queen trade you know the more pieces my opponent gets off the board the
better he uses the counter play to get pieces off the board uh and then trade pieces because at the
end of the day my opponent is up two pawns but my opponent here did something that you shouldn't do
he tried to create counter play on both sides of the board and that just backfired and it
backfired because i immediately swarmed on the queen side and again his position was stretched
too thin he created a weakness and i was actually the one that was able to get back into the game
by activating his pieces he should have kept his focus on this side and continued to chip away
this opponent i actually played a few games so the very next game my opponent played the move f5
sacrificing a pawn so that his bishops can line up toward my king and i have this sort of
situation on the board now again we're talking about activating pieces here i can move my my
knight back but that's not going to be good he's just going to continue to stockpile pressure
i can also take his bishop but my logic for not doing this was that i'm trading off my only active
piece it's not like i can go here because he just takes and so i didn't really like that i felt like
my bishop and my knight were still passive and instead i played knight to d4 and my logic here
was that if he takes me now i continue to create threats so activating your pieces yes i do have
a little bit of a threat to go knight to b3 so he plays bishop b1 that's bait knight b3 doesn't work
because then he will move his queen these two pieces threaten checkmate and my knight is hit
excuse me my knight is hit so i can't take his rook anymore he plays this move bishop b1 now
again we're talking about activating pieces how does black activate a piece here like you
can you have to create counter play so how does black activate a piece here and create a thread
with the move knight c5 so i've now i'm actually trying to activate a second piece and get into
this territory now both of the queen's squares are taken and he can't actually create the battery to
my king so my opponent plays knight e2 and here i saw a nice combination but at the end of the day
it's not about necessarily the combo it's about the fact that excuse me my opponent has got
very active pieces and i need to keep kind of pace with him so here i play knight b3
and we say well levy you just said you know he's gonna go here and even though the rook's in danger
he's the one threatening a mate yes but now because we've activated a piece we have extra
tactical possibilities and the move e4 blocking the queen from giving mate and if he takes here i
have the move f5 i also can take the the knight right away with check during the game i hadn't
seen what to do here because i thought well he's just threatening mate and the knight is hanging
but i had this and i can allow him to check me and if he takes the knight here i have to move
rookie eight and the queen is stuck basically he can take or go here but the because the bishop is
the only thing protecting the king i just break through i just did i didn't see that it was a
blizz game uh and so i decided that i was going to play e4 this this protects that square so no check
then i take and then i take the rook and a little tactical flurry later i'm a baroque and he's no
longer checkmating me and we only were able to create this counterplay by activating our pieces
and so this takes me to the next example uh i was playing this grand master in a blitz game
and the opening was a disaster i made a mistake and i had to play bishop e7 in bishop f8 to
protect against this he's got very active pieces he's not letting me castle this way
so now we're not talking about activating pieces anymore we're actually talking about uh chopping
away at your opponent's um active pieces and looking for a timely break in the position
so a moment where you can break through to create some counter play so you'll notice that obviously
i try to castle as fast as possible and my opponent plays bishop e3 fully developed
bishops are solid uh i'm not gonna have some crazy peace activation here so instead
i bring the bishop back and i start to trade off his active peace i do that successfully
now this this bishop trade is up for grabs and that would have been good for me but my opponent
played bishop b5 now in this position there is one move which is black's best move it's the
best move to create counter play create counter chances and no longer have such a passive position
it's a break i say break you should be thinking of a certain piece you should be thinking on break d5
and my opponent in the game took this pawn and i had foreseen that even though i can't take because
of the pin i'm creating enough counter play in the center of the board that it doesn't really
matter he plays queen takes e4 and here i missed a really nice idea i could have played bishop d5
queen d3 and the move queen h7 maintaining vision here and both queens protect the knight but now
this is a threat because i'm no longer pinned in the game i simply offered a trade of queens
and then he blundered a bishop so my opponent just completely inexplicably forgot that
he was no longer pinning me and i want a bishop i went on to win the game but at this point black's
position is already completely fine because i'm no longer passive i traded off his active pieces
and i created some serious counter play this next game is not going to be about creating
a break the next example is going to be about actually the next two examples are going to be
uh creating counter play to the enemy king first we'll start with this example i was playing a
blitz game against an fm and i obviously have a solid positional advantage i have a lot more space
um i've got a bind on his pawn structure my knight is about to jump in and here i notice that after
bishop f5 i can give a check and my opponent can go to either direction but he will lose a pawn due
to tactical reasons and i saw that i could take he takes this way this is hanging and in the game
if he had taken with this then this picks up a pawn this way so he played gf5 and i just took
this pawn i didn't even you know free pawn got to take it but now my opponent plays a move creating
counter play on my king rook d8 and in the game he then activated his knight this way a5 because
he can't he couldn't do it this way because of my pawn so he activates his knight and i was looking
to trade but it got so bad in the game that he actually missed a winning opportunity he kept
bothering me he activated all his pieces and right here he missed the win he could have played takes
takes and not takes but give me a check first and if i try to protect both pawns it's an illusion
it's not actually protected because if i take it he has this now he's suddenly winning two pawns
for the cost of losing one originally and i'm in big trouble so he could have played like this
and he just didn't see that and he took like this and that allowed me to create some consolidation
get it into a you know night end game and then go on to win this next example is not about creating
little counter play to the king it's about going all out this is going to be the most fun example
of the day i was playing this this fm from poland i think that's poland right totally poland and
at this point i was down two pounds from the opening and i decided to go a little crazy
he gave me this check i could have protected with my queen i said nah take my rook and there's going
to be games that you're down material e5 creating counter play down the center of the board because
there's a king right there my opponent gave me a check but he didn't actually realize that he's
trapping his own bishop he can't check me with the queen i'm so bad at drawing arrows today
and then in this position i didn't even take i don't want his knight to get developed
so i stayed patient i took a pawn now his knight can no longer develop the queen covers that square
and then even though he got two pawns now it's four pieces playing versus a queen and that's
exactly how the game went even though i was down material my four pieces played the rest
of the game i mean he just never got to move his pieces literally he never got to move his pieces
and i just kept bothering him with mine and slowly brought my rook back and i ended up winning the
game and the final position those pieces never moved so even though he was up a rook in the
middle game i created enough threats to his king that he never got two pieces into the game that is
how you create counter play when you're down a lot of material for this next game it's still about
creating counter play by attacking and activating your pieces but it's a little bit less crazy
i had this position against an im and he played the move knight f6 just developing at this point
it should come as second nature how do you start your counter play in this position understand that
black is a few moves away from getting comfortable so come up with something now i'll you can pause
here you can think about it so i'm going to tell you this it is not the move e5 it is also not the
move bishop takes f6 why are you trading pieces for what why e5 makes a little bit more sense
but you can just stop the thought right there because now nothing has changed if anything you
opened up your opponent's bishop then knight is extremely strong but i understand if you think
that e5 is the right move like it it you know you're thinking i need to activate i need to do
some damage with my pawn the right move is not e5 the right move is rook c1 and try to get down to
c7 to pressure the bishop and go win this activate your most valuable piece now we see the other idea
if my opponent castles the knight is protecting the bishop and not the king now you would take
and the difference is now you win a bishop before you don't make that trade because it doesn't do
anything so that's what happened in the game and my opponent backed up and i just kept my rook here
and even though he defended himself i took now because when he takes back i play knight c4 he
still cannot castle and now i have a new target now in the game he just blundered he played
here and i won some pawns and i just won all his pawns and i went on to win of course that didn't
have to happen uh let's back up uh after knight c4 he can also play something like king to e7
but then i bring the second knight and i just have way more active pieces than he does even though i
was down one pawn now i'm threatening knight c6 how does he even stop that look i'll give you an
example of what it can turn into check hear check here and i take the bishop i can actually have a
choice i have a choice of which bishop to take so it's all about activating your pieces and not
letting your opponent feel solidity for the last example i'm going to show you a position from the
rating climb i'm doing the rating climb series when i start at 800 i play against subscribers
uh twitch subscribers but you're you know feel free if you're just watching on youtube to check
out those climbs we do them live basically every day i had this position with the white pieces
against the 1100 rated player and in the game he did this he castled and i started an attack on his
king i actually sacrificed the piece started a big attack and i ended up winning the game
but here my opponent could have actually started counter play himself he's down a pawn he doesn't
have a great position he should have played the move g5 and on bishop g3 he can continue to create
counter play on the side of the board first of all he can play a move like this to just excuse me i'm
so bad at arrows today pressure my center and then play like knight f5 h5 and so on or something for
example like rook g8 the engine won't love a move like rook g8 because now it thinks that white is
going to be the one attacking but your point is this if white plays a slow move now you play h5
h4 g4 you're creating counter play you're not just sitting there going hmm what's a solid move that
doesn't do anything but you know also doesn't blunder no put pressure on your opponent so
even in my raiding climb series there are moments that my opponents can play certain ideas that are
very very strong and if they play them then great it's going to be a really competitive game but
hopefully this uh you know this video inspires you to create counter play in different ways
activating your pieces attacking just going crazy all out not giving up and not just sitting there
and playing passive moves anyway let me know what other concepts for the chess tip series you'd like
me to add sometimes you guys write like random things hey levy make a opening series you know
let's try to keep suggestions and chess tips videos primarily to chess tips what concepts
you'd like to see me cover i already have a few ideas but i'll come up with more if you like the
way i teach you want to pick up an openings course there's a link in the description and
as always join our community we have over 8 000 people in the gotham city discord you can talk to
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take a look at that as well and i will see you in the next video