On a warm July Monday evening, a number of Club Members of varying strengths crammed into the Club Room to spend a tough couple of hours to intensively examine and walkthrough a number of Chess Tactics scenarios.

Everyone formed pairs with one stronger player teamed up with a weaker player and the aim was for the weaker players to learn better tactical moves from both the stronger player and walking through each tactical exercise.

Chris Jones, the Club Secretary, shared various tactical situations from his previous games as well as some Grandmaster level classical plays.

The key takeaways from the evening were understanding which of the Player's strongest pieces actually posed threats to the Opponent and from there which tactical maneuvers were best  so that each move was a threat. When it is unknown how the Opponent would respond, it is worth investing some time analysing ALL opponent potential responses including subtle ones which might shock the Player.

A common position seen was when the Opponent's King was exposed and/or trapped into the corner and the regular use of Deflection, where captures and sacrifices to coerce the King or Defender to a particular Square, was a common tactic which exploited this.

This was an excellent educational evening where minds were certainly stretched and lessons for later application were gratefully received.

Many Thanks Chris for taking the time and effort to set this up and present it to the Club...
 
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