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Chess is a game of balance and a game of tension. When we make an attack with a piece, we simultaneously place that piece at risk. Risk and opportunity are two sides of the same coin. If we castle on the same side, pushing the pawns in front of our king to launch an attack on the opponent’s king weakens our king’s defense. This is often worse for the aggressive player. So a potential strategy is to castle to the opposite side so that we can launch pawns not rostered for the king’s defense to attack! The risk of course, is that the opponent can do the same to us. However, in the right setting such as this game, this strategy can create a powerful attack on the king.

The opponent’s strategic mistake in this game was that they chose to castle king-side, when I had already advanced my pawns on that side into the field of battle. Comparatively, their pawns on the queenside were less well organised – they had no pawn on the b-file, and had doubled pawns on the c-file. Coordinating my king-side pawns with my rook and bishop resulted in more attackers than defenders with a transformation to an undoubtedly winning endgame for me.

I hope you enjoyed this video, and thanks for watching!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/37839035395

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2022.02.05"]
[Round "?"]
[White "vitualis"]
[Black "ThisTerpSays"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "B23"]
[WhiteElo "1254"]
[BlackElo "1164"]
[TimeControl "1800"]
[EndTime "14:44:34 PST"]
[Termination "vitualis won by resignation"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 d6 4. Bc4 e6 5. Nf3 Nf6 6. d4 d5 7. exd5 exd5 8. Bb5 a6 9. Bxc6+ bxc6 10. Qe2+ Qe7 11. Qxe7+ Bxe7 12. h3 a5 13. Be3 Bf5 14. O-O-O c4 15. g4 Be4 16. Rhf1 a4 17. a3 Bxf3 18. Rxf3 Nd7 19. f5 f6 20. h4 O-O 21. g5 g6 22. gxf6 Rxf6 23. Bg5 Rxf5 24. Rxf5 Bxg5+ 25. Rxg5 Kg7 1-0