how to play chess endgames book

7 The Fight for the Initiative
Initiative means superiority.
JOSE RAUL CAPABLANCA
Nowhere is time-wasting
ished than in chess.
SAMUEL RESHEVSKY
more severely pun-
Just as in the other phases of the game, the
struggle for the initiative also plays an important
role in the endgame. Only the side that has
the initiative can impose his own ideas and simultaneously
compel the opponent to drop his
own plans. So always try to fight for the initiative
and dictate the course of events. A game of
chess does not win itself!
The possession of the initiative is a dynamic
advantage and therefore not necessarily longlasting.
Consequently the difficulty often resides
not only in seizing the initiative, but also
in retaining and exploiting an existing initiative.
We shall examine several examples of both
these themes in this chapter.
A) The Importance of the
Initiative
If an advantage is of a short-term and dynamic
nature, then rapid and active exploitation is indicated.
Only if you can manage to remain in
control, do you have the chance of retaining or
transforming the advantage.
We should like to illustrate this first through
the especially interesting special case of the
endgame of rook and knight against rook and
knight. Here a slight initiative can often be
enough to make life hard for the opponent.
The following position is almost symmetrical,
but the white knight is actively placed and it
is White to move.
1 f!.acl li:ld7 2 f!.fdl li:lcS 3 b4 li:la4?!
7.01
V.Smyslov - P.Benko
Monte Carlo 1969
3 ... li:le4 4 llc6 e5 5 lldcl f!.xc6 6 li:lxc6 Vf6
is almost equal.
4li:lb5
If 4 li:lc6?! then 4 ... lac7 stops the white initiative
in its tracks.
4 ... J;ixcl S J;ixcl aS 6 a3 1ld8 7 l;l.c7 f!.dS 8
li:la7 axb4 9 axb4 e6
9 ... @f6!?.
10 li:lc6 (D)
8
10 ... J;id2?