Chess: Learn to Play the French Defense Like a Master

1. French Defense Promo: The French defence is one of the oldest openings and chest and it has a huge history and it's been analyzed death. So there's lots and lots of different variations and different things to know. There's also a lot of known traps and tricks that you need to know to avoid in the French if you're playing white against it and ways that you can trap your opponent as black and get an early advantage in the game. The French defence is an aggressive response to White's first move E four, and it has a lot of little tricks and tactics, and little video secrecy is in the opening that make it very difficult to play gives for white, especially if you're a point, doesn't know it very well. So the French fences really, really strong opening for black against you, for in this course, I'm gonna teach you guys everything you need to know in order to get a great position every single time when you play with the black pieces against E four 2. Lesson 1 Introduction to the French Defense: open the class. We're going to be learning the French defence now. This is one of the oldest openings has been very deeply studied and, as with some of the other major hoping like a Spanish at the names of Indian which I also have courses on, the French defence is one that is still used by the top grandmasters and everybody knows it really well. All those top players and so whoever has the deepest knowledge of the opening combined with the best calculations. Of course, the high lovely of three will calculate very, very, very deeply and very well. It is going to win the game and at the lower levels that term in levels that most of you guys are probably playing at somewhere between ratings of 1218 100. That's for the vast majority of chess players or you guys need to know the French defence. I need to know the main ideas behind it and how to achieve a good position with it out of the Olympics. The French fence is a really good aggressive reply to why playing e four when they played before. The most common reply is Horsey five, which goes into the Italian, Spanish and many other very good, very solid positions or black, the French offensive a little more aggressive and it can often make quite very uncomfortable. I personally don't like playing against the French defence. When I play that white pieces. I know how to play is very well. I don't like how it fuels because, as you'll see from this course, the French defence, it's easy to play and you get a really good position almost no matter what. For black and even though, technically, according to the computers and according to the grandmasters, the position lightning, equal or white may even have an edge in many different scenarios. It's easy for black to play, and we have pressure on White's position and a Z you learn as you get better at chess. Psychology is a very large factor, and especially when you're playing blitz, it makes a big difference. When you know the ideas behind the opening and we're trying to achieve, you could make your moves much more quickly and know you're making really, really strong moves without having to calculate a ton on every single move. So without further ado, the first will be places you play, e six, the idea being that we're basically gonna let White have the center for a few moves, and then we're going to counterattack and try to break their centre down. And so the best one for white in the most common is a sippy pitbull of their ponds and the middle. We're gonna look at some different scenarios in terms of what they do. This what they do that looks awesome. Different variations, of course, but the most common thing to do and the best thing to do is put bold Eurobonds in the middle of your opponent, gives you the chance of a bolt of your piece of the middle taken nights out on the boat with strong center. But of course you want to want to do that, but we immediately attack the center by playing D five. Okay, now there are a lot of different variations in the French that are very officer. We're going to go over all of them in this course. Okay, but it's very briefly. I'm going to give you a little intro to different variations. So if White chooses to simply take this pawn here allowing us to take back. This is very good for Black. This is called the exchange variation. Now, as you probably know, White has a little initiative in chess because they get to move first. So it's blacks job. Take with that initiative and then to seek an advantage. So by allowing us to trade ponds after the first couple of moves like this, allowing us to get our our bishop here on C one how we want to and basically giving a symmetry in a center right here White is actually helping black. This is not the best way for White to place. You'll see a lot of grandmasters don't play the exchange creation cause you're basically giving black equilibrium. And even though you still are ahead by one temple or one move, it's very, very equal. And so it's very droschak position. As we say, however, I actually like to play the exchange variation for White. As you'll learn later, it avoids a lot of the complexity than the positions that Black actually likes to play. Simply due to have comfortably are to play and how easy they are to play, as I kind of alluded to. So the exchange Creation is pretty popular. It's used a lot. But if they play this assed black, we are have you. And we're gonna go over this in detail later on. Okay? So if one chooses not to play the exchange creation, oftentimes what they will do as they will put them up on here on the five, pushing it past hours. This is called the advance variation that this takes space noticed. White has more space than us, which is why we will immediately play C five. This is a really common theme in the French defence is kind of the idea that someone, usually white, will play the five trying take space and walk this pond down. And then we will fight on this queen side against the center and we're gonna be moving our pieces out on the queen sides. We have a very clear plan. We're gonna open up this See file at some point for ruk or queen on the sea file and pressure down here on this pond or whatever pieces are down here, we're going to castle that we're gonna have a really good pawn chain that ends up helping us a lot in the end game. If the pieces get traded off, Black will often have an advantage in the end game. So it's another good reason to play the French defence. You really solid king position and you get a really good upon shame. Now, oftentimes, in the advance creation of the French defence, you'll have this problem here when you have a weak bishop. This Lightsquared Bishop is blocked in by this pond and you may be able to open that up later. There's a few different ways we could do that. I'll show you how you also me. You may be able Teoh your bishop over here before you think of your night at trade the bishop off. Why? It was a good thing to be able to do if you get the opportunity. But basically the weakness of the French defense is that you will oftentimes have this week , Bishop, and you trade that somewhat of a disadvantage in order to have those other things already talked about Order. Have a nice attack on the center. A nice open sea file that we're gonna have in these poems have traded at a really good on structure and safe king you have a weakness. Everything and chest is a trade off. So you get something and you give up something else. That's just the way this. So you need to be able to analyze and assess a positive, advantageous trade offs. That's what it's all about. And as you accumulate trade offs throughout the game, you get an advantage. And then eventually, you will either be able to build a position where you can check me or you can force them through your threats to win material. And then, of course, when the game. So this is called the advance creation, we're going to play here on C five. Okay, now, another variation for that is common is to play. This is called the, uh te rash creation, where you put the night here on D to the reason being that you're defending this pond now. But instead of putting it on a C three where you block in this pond and you allow this fish to come down and make a pin on the night, for example, if I would have put the night here and then this Bishop McDonough makes a pin if they immediately try to force a trade, and this seems awkward for White, at least in a position called the Winner We're opening or of you. Put this bishop here and defended. It just seems kind of passive. And it's not really comfortable, for White is one of things I was talking about a moment ago. A lot of the visions for white that is kind of uncomfortable in your pieces can kind of get tangled up a little bit, whereas for black, everything comes out nice and smooth, and it's easier to play. The top grandmasters actually know gonna play these positions very, very well, obviously. So they actually aren't afraid of this. They will put the night here, and a black want to trade off their good Bishop C. This is a good worship. It's a very strong bishop because on the opposite colors from the ponds and as I mentioned the lights for a visual of the week, so doesn't make any sense for Black to make this trade. So, like goes like this and the way trade it is look kind of awkward, But actually, this is fine for White, even though it's a double upon its not really weakness because we have really good bishops . In this case. We can get them out and then black. We can't really fight against this dark sport, bishop very well, because we don't have a doctor bird bitch of anymore. So even though it kind of looks like it messes up the white pawn chain, this is totally fine for White. In fact, it's a little bit better than black, so we don't actually want to trade that off. Eso white doesn't need to fear. This, however, has said can be awkward. It can be uncomfortable, and black gets a nice pressure by doing that. So a lot of people, they want to avoid that and they play the Tarak opening that avoids that. So they put the night there and then in the camp that the bishop, because pollen would come out. And that's the nice thing about can do this because they just get a tempo and strengthen upon chain. We have to move again, and so we would probably continue to just developer pieces. We decide to take this pond immediately than whites if it takes, and this isn't so great for Black. We've got a solid position, but it's passive. It's not exactly what we are trying to achieve, so we we do this, then we will simply leave that pond as it is, and we will develop our pieces as normal, take out our night and any point taken, transfer into or transposed into the advance variation. That's fine. But excuse me, we don't want to get out there. We want to play C five. This is the key move in the French because this is how we're gonna get all our pieces out if they trade here, we simply take it back with Bishop. Take here, take back on. Any of these trades in the center will essentially help black. So we're not really worried about that. But when you do have to potential trains here with the ponds, then you wanted to calculate very carefully. But of course, we're gonna go into that in more detail later. Finally, if they decide to play, this is called The win over the woman. Grandmaster is usually choose not worried at all about the speech coming down, as I said, and also it's not necessarily the best move for black depends what China achieved. But if you do decide to bishop down. It's totally fine if they threaten it. You get it off where you move it back. So they go like this. You go here. They're not gonna do this in the situation is kind of a week situation for them. It's kind of a bad on structure. Somewhat will only happen as you would just move your picture back here, keep the pen and go from there. So it's a it's a fine move. Or you could be, um, this immediately play C five, which is usually the best thing to do. Develop your bishop out later. So we're gonna go into all the best moves. You can play in what is called the window or opening as well. So basically, those are the four most common French defence openings. Exchange variation. The advance variation the winner were. And then what's the other one? J advancement er and a terrace. Sh OK, so that's when you play the 92. That was the tear ash. We're gonna look over those and we're also gonna look at sea. Well, what do you do if your client doesn't notably the French very well and they're actually making even worse. moves, so we need to know how to take advantage of that. Of course, a lot of your points will not know the openings very well, and the whole point of us knowing them is to be able to get a really strong advantage in the game. So welcome the course because there's a ton and we're gonna get straight to it. 3. Lesson 2 The Advance Variation: we're gonna go over the advance creation first, because it is the most common pretty much among all levels. It tends to be what is played because it's kind of a natural thing for white to move this pond down. Once black place D five pawn to move this pawn on here seemed like the natural thing to do because you avoid a trade of the center. You're getting space. And give this bond to a nice position. That is a nice natural thing for White to place. You'll see this probably the most. And so as we already saw the movie gonna immediately play. That's really important. To get this move in before anything else happens is to play C five and challenge this pond . Now, if you're playing it's a week player, they will take it. And then this is a force great for black. We get our most active piece are strong Dark Board Bishop out. Now this pawn is all by itself. I mean, they could defend it, but they're gonna Teoh use a lot of resource is to defend his pawn, which they're gonna have to do because now it's a really important piece. Our bishop is aimed down here at two. And this is better for Black, so it makes no sense for White to trade that piece off this pond. And so most people, they won't do it. They will simply develop their pieces. So there's a few different things you can do in the advanced variation. We're gonna kind of go deeply in this opening because you're gonna see it a lot. And there are a few main moves and we need to know what to do against each. Usually the white sign, Take the night out and they will just defend this Pollen now is defended by two pieces. And so this is what happened to the French offense. There's a theme where we take out our pieces of we attack this public pressure on the Deport upon and white defense. And so this is why it's a fun opening in a very clear opening for Black to play. We know exactly what we're trying to do, and the pieces get out in a very harmonious way, and that's very nice. So we'll go 96 now. We have two pieces on the pond. They have two defenders. What, like will often do at this stage is simply move this pond. See, too Teoh c three defended third time, and then they're going to be moving their night two d two. Okay, and they could reroute the night over toe, see three of the red moment. If they wish, they can leave it there, and they could be on head of the bishop, which is a common thing to see for White in the French defence, depending on how everything plays out. But this is a natural thing to do because it's defends this Defour pon, and then they will develop the night here. Everything is quite are millions for white side as well right now. But the nice thing from the psychological point of view is that black, even though they're in the position of moving second and they don't have the initiative, the White House were the ones with pressure on a square. We have pressure on the D foursquare White is having to defend. This is why a lot of people, including myself, avoid playing, gets a French event because you'll see it's also pretty easy from black to get their pieces out aimed at this king. That could be kind of exposed a little bit in the French and is really easy for White messing up. Basically, if White knows what they're doing, they get a really good position of the French defence and they can oftentimes win games but really easy to mess up. Whereas for Black it's very, very easy to get an optimal set up and there is really nothing that we can mess up this we just mess up, move or making just a terrible wrong moves. As long as we know we're trying to accomplish here. It's just easier for Black to play, which is why it's still really popular opening at all levels of game. But especially at the lower levels. White is no one of playing it very well and so black and oftentimes get a really big advantage. So it's really a must know opening. If you're an amateur chess player, I mean any level you know, the French defence. So why would play this and then through the breast do now is we just add another piece to the pressure on the force. We take our queen out, we put it on B six and so we're aiming three pieces. Now, the night the queen and upon all at this pond here on the floor and at any moment should we decide to do so, We can trade this off and then while we force think back and they're still gonna have this center structure here, but we're gonna have nice, active pieces coming out on the Queen side. As I mentioned, we're gonna move the rock over to see one rhythm with a special two d seven. And even though the bishop will stay a passive piece, we're kind of getting it out of the way. It's a defensive peace, and we get the RUC line over here. Then later on the game, thinking healthy Gil. Oftentimes this bishop will get opened up. It is upon trade in the center, or we can we can move it over here and put it in a more active square or even traded off. As I mentioned, I'm sort of totally useless piece, but it just is somewhat of a weekends for most of the game, usually. Hey, so tip looking for white to do here is either get the night over here on d two or more Common is the first move this lightsquared bishop so that white can get ready to capsule. So the most common moved here for why is simply to play a vision to see her excusing e to it's ah, good move Nice and solid and they prepare to castle. And so we're also just developing our pieces. We can immediately play the bishop to D seven or and then you're ready to move its brookover or we can prepare the castle. It's usually a good idea of the islands of chest is you get better, try to castle early and get a king tucked away. Nice estate. Nothing bad can happen to you if you do that. And in these situations where you always have the potential of this pond trade here, you don't make any assumptions. So even though nothing really changed the position, it doesn't seem like this Bishop just came out. We always want to calculate each time of pieces moved and see what happens to be taken out . If you take this pawn, they take you take, they take you, take the ticket. They've got three defenders. You've got three Attackers. You can't take it yet unless you just want to trade this off and then do something afterwards. There's no real reason to do that. So we're gonna go ahead and leave this as it is, we'll let the tension, um, stay as we say in chest way. Don't relieve the tension. We're not gonna leave the attention and just make sure that you don't make a mistake here. What have they take? Same thing we still we could just take back with Bishop or the Queen, but most naturally, Bishop, because that would develop into the peace for us. And then we have a threat here aimed at F two. So it makes no sense still for white to trade here. There. Simply gonna try to get ready to Castle. We want to continue develop our pieces and one of the best ways to do that Now, besides going bishop to D seven and moving the rock over is to put this night here on E seven and then with the idea that we're gonna move it to G six next in that way, our night gift to it. Active square weaken. Put our bishops on e seven and castle and it will have a really good position and then we'll see later. Oftentimes in French offensive way to gain space for us is Teoh Play F six. What's Our bishop is here on Ben. We're gonna try to pressure the center on both sides now, so there's a lot of different ways to get a good advantage out of the French events. So we're gonna put the night here on the seven, but we're not gonna leave him there. He blocks in our bishops, so it's not really good place for the B, but we're moving him next here. Let's just say that White castles and we move our night over now are nights in a good spot and we can prepare to get our fish about. Everything is good. And what is gonna continue to focus on defending this piece and developing their pieces? So now what's gonna start looking at a couple different options? He may want to simply tradeoff queen and have a better position. A lot of people do that they want to other because this queen here's is a quite active piece and so white. Sometimes once it make us move it back or trade it off and then white maintains the small tempo advantage that they have to be in the game. But it's not a very common move. Nothing you might see is the bishop to come out here to eat three going this cause now, if they think it's pawn in the next move, we take back, they take back. It would just be a big trade, but it makes it so. It's further bolsters its pawn. It develops the bishop, and it's just something that is often played. And that way they can get a night out on the next move and their pieces out in a way that is harmonious. That's a pretty common thing. You'll see. Another thing, though. The problem is, though they move, they make that move right now, notice that this Polynice hanging will win upon. It's a common thing that happens in the French adventure to be careful, and so again it just shows you it's kind of awkward for White, really careful with their move, or they can't get this bishop out yet. They lose upon. But they put the knight on D two right now. Then they are blocking in this bishop and hasn't moved yet. And so it's a little bit awkward, but for Black, it's nicest move, not stop, awkward and all we know we're trying to achieve we can make our move really quickly, whereas White kind has to calculate a lot more than we do. So what a lot of people will do in this situation and this is a pretty good solution is they'll play B three and then they'll fianca their bishop and then it kind of it defends their center and it makes it so they can't lose this pawn anymore, and it allows the pieces to get out. Well, the queen is still aimed at the center, so it's a pretty common thing to see in the French defence. And again, we're the ones black that gets to decide if and when this pond is traded off here in a stand. So we kind of have this control over the situation. And once this life support bishop moves over here to be to that allows us to move her night down here, threaten to trade off their lights word bishop, and it allows us to get down into their positional of it. So this is going to show you guys because It's a common move. And it's usually the best thing for White to play here in many scenarios. Were simply going to get our bishop out at the pretty castle. They're going beyond Keto. We're gonna Castle. Okay, so this is a really common position that you'll see in the advance variation or you haven't seen a trade yet. Center. We already know what happens if white trays, we get advantage and we get a nice set up for a piece. So it makes no sense for them resting thing to do is to defend this part of continue, defend this part, and we're gonna continue to put pressure on this, okay? And one thing we can dio later on already mentioned it is we switchboard this f upon and it's fine because this point is easy to fence, not a weakness. And then it helps us to try decayed space and put pressure right here. So, as you can see a say, for example, White does something like this. They take a night out right here, just developing their pieces. Those who still have 123 defenders the D four pawn. We have three Attackers. Okay, we will continue develop our pieces as well so I can play F six just yet. We're gonna get our bishop up, continue with our development and get ready to move our look over toe. See, I see eight and then they make sense for us at some point. Trade off this pond. So our roof is aimed down the board and it's just a nice set up to have something to show you guys, the let's say we see some normal lose. Let's say they move their brookover first. Then we either move, look over or we can play this nice man F six in the French offense. This is a very thematic move and because then if they take it, it's kind of the same thing as before. We can take back and now we have pressure on the centre were kind of destroying the center and we got a really nice pawn chain. They could also trade this off who are queen over, and we have this central ponds, which is really good. We have a really good position if they do that and White has given us the advantage. We have a strong storm ponds. It could push board, and we have very active pieces. So just to give you an example of something that looks really good here, let's just say we push were able to put this pawn for This is a very nice center, our bishop in Come out. We have a lot of tactics and opportunity in a lot of space. Really? Really good outcome. So again, it would be not being whites interest to take right here. Okay, Now again, Take right here. Same thing. I mean, they could do something like this and make up pieces back. That doesn't do any good. I mean, you know, just gives them really weird pawn structure. Says it never do a thing and chest, you know, make a move where it only helps me for one for you. You know, you're pushing your opponent back, but it actually doesn't give you anything in the long run. Everything in chest we dio strategically for the long are thinking about our position. We're thinking about making favorable trays or think about endgame. And so things like that give us make a weakness in our position. We don't have weaknesses. Okay? So again, White simply has to defend the center and we're building up more pressure. And also we concocted. Okay, Would next move. I said he does something again like this. Now let's say we take right here. He takes back notice we have two Attackers both of these nights on this pawn he would lose upon because we can just take it. Okay? He was a nice so you can't do that. So basically, we would just get a pop, would win upon for nothing. And we have a really, really strong center in that case. So he has to be really careful. Once we go, here's gotta think. OK? Now. Gotta defend both East e four and E five ponds. Well, what's the best way for me to do that? So this is a really good example of how it's easy for white to make a mistake and not properly defend a center. And then we can break a center open and get a really good position. So without going too long, we'll continue from here in the next lesson. 4. Lesson 3 The Advance Variation with f6: so notices position. White hasn't really made any mistakes. They haven't made any bad news. It is develop normally the defendant's pond. But notice how black is the one that has all the pressure. Everything is harmonious for us. All of our pieces air coming out and are active. I mentioned that we have this sort of weak piece here on the seven. But as we'll see, we're gonna activate this piece. We're gonna get a really strong center at any point why it can easily make a mistake and get a worse position. And it's easy for White to make a mistake, not only because of the complexity of the fact that they're having to defend, but it's not fun to constantly being in the defensive mode. So they'll usually be itching to make a trade a trade that will be just advantageous or to do something aggressive and play into blacks hands here. So a seven last lesson any of these trays? If white trades off these ponds that it just helps black, and so why is going to be looking for ways to be aggressive? Got something? Otherwise, blacks has been getting a better and a better position here. So one thing that white may want to do notice there's no way to defend this upon another time is no pieces that could come out. I could defend it again. It hasn't this pond right here on before and has this knight on F six. And so next move, we're going to be able to take this point we have upon and two nights, that's three pieces. End of this, we're gonna win upon. And so now why is thinking Oh, gosh, what I do here, basically the only way to play this is to trade off the pieces and give us a good position . So, for example, let's say they go ahead and they do this trade here on C five to take back with the bishop . Then when they take this on F six, now they have They're forcing us basically to take back with this pawn here. And so it's kind of weird for our king because we take about with the RUC. Then they have this nice temple gating move where they can go here and then do discovery on our look to move it groups with all the way back, please and then they take this pawn and now we trade. And now it's actually fine because we don't have a strong center that we wanted to. We have an isolated pawn and they were able Teoh improve their position. Other pieces are going toe come out or easily and really even position. But we've got isolated on now something that could be attacked whereas they did. This shows you a really small error and chest. Really tiny miscalculation for not careful. Also that change the dynamic of the position immensely. You have to be really careful now. If they take this pawn and we take back with clean, then it's a little bit different. I mean, they could make a queen. We begin by playing C four before, but that doesn't help them at all. There's really nothing that they could dio um, here. Except for now they take this off, but this time take back with Bishop. We have the advantage. We have a strong pawn center and weaken. Potentially trade up a special notice, suspicious, not offended. And so it's pin. They can't move his pawn down. And this is very favorable for Black. This is a very nice comfortable position for us. Okay, So we would want to take back with the queen if they do make that trade. Um, right there. Okay. Now, another thing that can dio to react to this issue. Simply push this pond down on C three and we could calculate every single variation, every single scenario we have to calculate very carefully. See what is? I replied, each of these moves. And so this is a situation in chess. You have a lot of tension in the center and a lot of possible pon trays where you need to spend a lot of time thinking. And this is why we choose openings and learn opening well, so that we can make a lot of the moves of the beginning without thinking too much and using up time on our clock. So when it comes to a critical position like this, that could determine the outcome of the game, we can think deeply and be very, very careful. Look at every single variation and it has to do with planning and managing time. Okay, So don't be afraid. Spend a big chunk of time on a position like this because whatever happens that there's a big trade off, it will largely determine the position and the outcome of the rest of the games. What's really important? So we want to look at the trades they could make, Gonna look at any other moves that could dio that might be able to hurt us. And definitely this candidate move onto sea floor is an option for White because it opens up this diagonal and it allows their bishop to aim down here next. They could look at taking this pawn and really, it opens the board up for them. OK, so this is a good move for them. And so we're gonna look at what we do now. So they've got two pieces of nine in the Bishop defending C four, so they're gonna lose upon here, But they got counter play. They've got counter place we're gonna look at. Do we take here? Do we take their What were you so they've defended this e five square, but now they're gonna lose a point to see if they decide to play that we can take. If they take this pawn, we would win apiece, and so obviously that's unacceptable. So that's not good But what's gonna happen is if they play that move before on we take this pond, they're not gonna take back. There's gonna look Teoh, basically sacrifice upon in order to get counter place. This is a tricky situation that we would want Teoh calculate carefully. So if they leave this pawn here, what is something that white can do? What in between moves do they have? Let's say, for example, now they just trade off this pawn we take back here. Now we have this plan is defended, but they are making dynamic moves to open up the position. Not, for example, they could push this pond down and make a clean move and get this sort of an outpost in the position of said. We have to move it back now. This is a really, really good position for Black, actually. So why it was getting desperate and you'll see there's a lot in the French offense as White tries to defend its for this in the center. They've got a player's risky moves and they've got to do things that are really difficult and then our position is really easy to play. We just basically keep our Saul position. We've got a really strong center. This is a losing position for why it is not much. They're going to be able to do so. That would be very favorable for us. It just goes to show you that knowing the opening really helps a lot because it gives you a lot of different ways. Toe win. We know there. There are two or three themes in the French defence. So one of them is that we're going to see file, which we haven't utilized yet. Another one is pressure on the C four pawn, and then another one is at some point playing F six. A lot of people learn the Francie for the first few move like Okay, well, what do I do now? Let's see what a lot of good might do with trade this pawn off like this. And then maybe they will who put the RUC over like this. If whites already done that, then it's not really much of an advantage. And this business I do too much, they think seems well. This is OK. It's not that great. Let's say that White continues by moving the lookout. Maybe black would do something like a upon here and get ready to expand on the Queen side. There's not really much of a plan. So really, really key idea is to play this F 16. It's really, really important thing to know, to do it another way to open position and put pressure on the center and it gets a little bit of space is not much that White can do to play well against it, except for to trade unfavorably from his side and kind of play into our hands here. Okay, so just remember the any of the trades that why it makes with us we're going to have an advantage because of our strong pawn center. Okay, so this is probably the way that will work out best or white because they showed you they have this movie. I think with ruk they have this move and they have some pressure on us and it and isolate Spawn. But now, even though we've used this keys on to take back, we have a really strong pawn chain in the center. We're gonna push this board and it's gonna really hard or black blankets. They're going to trying to gain space something that they don't want to do now is attack are on in the center, and it's no problem that we could do something like this could push the pawn forward if they decide to do that. And now it's really difficult to make a spaceman with the night over threatening our bishop . We don't care. We're going Teoh, defend this plan and now we have a really strong, paunchy and if they trade off the night for a bishop, it's fine. Let him do it. There's not much they can do about this strong, such a punch, and we have a winning position here. We see defender center, push the palms forward and use them to our advantage. Their position is cramped and again it seemed like it was lose. Lose for white. There was nothing they could really do to get out of this. Even though they didn't make any huge mistakes, they didn't have the absolute best play that a grandmaster playing beginning. And so this is how you see, basically the French offend, gaining the big advantage. Okay, let's just look over this one more time before we move on so they dio before play sixth before 25 with the advanced variation by pushing upon down. So we immediately play C five key move. They just continue by defending. We get our pieces out, attacking it 96. The 63 will play queen toe. Be six, pressuring the force for the whole time while developing pieces. Okay, They need to castle. They put their bishop on me, too. We were at our 9th 2 g six. This is a position you're going to see over and over and over again. And you might see some slight variations, of course, because your clothes will make it removed. So the key idea. Just remember the theme of pressuring before looking for an opportunity to develop our pieces and then trade on D for they take at any stage, we're going to get an advantage in the center. So why it's gonna want it continue to defend Castle Castle and we're the driver's seat in this opening. Trickier for White to play. It's easier for us to play notice are pieces air set up in a very harmonious fashion. Our pawn change really strong, and we have a lot of things going for us. Why it is looking to develop it pieces entirely. Sure what to do here. And so the key mood, remember, is F six is we wanted Teoh f six. Okay. And then it leaves White Really nowhere to go. Whether they take it here or whether they take five, we're going to get an advantage. We're gonna try to maintain a strong such upon. Just be careful that any trains that happen do not end up leaving you with, uh, upon island with only one pawn all by. It's self. Okay, We don't want to see that. Okay, don't be afraid to have an advance upon hearing center. They're gonna be able to attack it later on. Here's gonna wanna defend you. Could defend about putting this on here on e 25 for example, Moving night back. That okay? We're just gonna attack this pond now. Well, we could just defend it. And once again, we have a really strong central pull information, and that's what f six move does for us. Undermines White's position, and it basically creates two witnesses chest or something called the principle of two weaknesses where usually once I can defend one week, so they have one potential. We guess where they were trying to defend before they had to put multiple pieces on defending the for. So we piled upon that. The playing of six. We create another weakest. Now we can also attack E five and so two witnesses. It's not much they can do. Something's got to give. They're gonna lose upon or they allow us to have a super strong central situation, even though right now material is equal. We have a big advantage in the Games were going into the middle game. The big advantage probably haven't advanced on the clock because we knew our opening really well. It should be our game toe win. Okay, so that's a crash course in the advance variation. Go out there, Pakistan As much as you can, try to follow the themes and make sure you play those key moves that we learn. And next we will look at another variation 5. Lesson 4 The Tarrasch Variation: Now we're gonna turn our attention to the terror of creation that I briefly introduced to you guys in the first lesson, which isn't were apply to expense. White defends that night deep to this is a really solid choice for white against French defence without playing the exchange very weight variation where you trade the ponds and kind of avoiding some of the ways in which you can easily make a mistake and let black a big position. You basically just leave the pond where it is and defended. So Black takes it, and White usually has a nicer position, and this is something that happens a lot in chest oftentimes will be a position where there's a potential on trade and the person who initiates the trade ends up losing in the position. And so it's kind of counterintuitive. Oftentimes, by doing nothing and simply holding Pat, we are making the best move. It's like a lot of that's hard for a lot of people because we want to take action. We want to be initiating trade, doing something oftentimes and chest. The best thing to do is by not doing anything and just making sure that if we don't take a piece that's offered to us, we calculate. Okay? We don't anything that we do, this other moves, what happens if they traded? And if we see that nothing bad happens to us, it's usually the strongest move is just leave it alone. And so in this case, that's true. We want to just leave our pieces there, and we're gonna look to do what we did before, which is the play C five and get a piece is out on the clean side and what white will do. For example, we place you five immediately. What white will dio is, they'll usually just simply defend upon upon again if we trade here now it take back and notice. They've got a nice center and we continue Just trade. Really, Millie now, Okay, they do have an isolated queen pond, but it's not. A week is in this case, because noticed our position is more passive. We don't have anything in the center. Um, we have, uh, open king. They have their pieces coming out or rapidly. So, you know, it's both Their pictures could come out and their night can get out. Just have a sort of Look at what would happen if we chose Teoh. Play this position. Okay, so they want to get our night out. I mean, they could trade the night. We get a We know that is, really benefit them so they can defend this night. Or they can just develop their pieces and moving night away. They could use something simple. They can't climb, go here and offended. Because if we trade, actually, can we just take this? Paul, take this pawn. You can. I, um we could actually take back with queen here and at any point we never have to worry about, like any kind of a check. If we're black in the French because it allows us to do is trade off, are blocked in lightsquared, bishop, and get their good bishop. They're good. Bishop is usually the white bishop. It's the most active piece. So if we can trade off ours, then that's fine. That doesn't help them at all effect. That would help us. But notice we meet a lot of trades and now is going into on equal position where this case , maybe black, has a small edge and there's gonna be fighting for winning to Daddy. This is basically what you have in the exchange variation as well. And for black. This is actually fine, because we taken away whites and issues. So why doesn't really want to make all the strange? But we can. We want to try to do something better. Um, better than this. Okay, so that is exactly what happened. You start making trades. Both sides kind of want to avoid. Making a trade is going into a dead equal position. Although that you're looking for a draw in your tournament, then that might be the way to go. Okay, so we don't want to trade it off and they don't want traded up either. Was gonna leave everything As it is. We develop our pieces and we are going Teoh night out. Pressure on before. The only thing about this terror ash opening. If you gotta always really careful that you calculate, as I said before on each move, what happens if I take it now? What's oppurtunity? What happens if I take it now? What special? So there's a lot more calculating going on in this situation, but oftentimes white, while some point go ahead and push this pond down to E five, which kind of transposed into the advance variation but transposed into the advance creation with 92 blocking in the bishops. So that happens sometimes. And then all the stuff that we learned about the advanced variation will apply. It will think about the position in the same way. And again, if White does something like make his pin, which is a common thing to do it and chest right in the night on the King investigation against the French event is making sense for them to do that, because we just take our bishop out and we're looking for an opportunity to trade off this pitch up. This is a wasted move for White. You'll see it a lot you'll see in the lower level of the game on the Internet. Players will do this because they just have this habit of making this pin and then castling . But it's not the best move against the French. If if this is why having chest knowledge will help you. Some things are good in certain situations, and other times they're not effective, and so we don't want to just be have habits and chest is always doing the same thing we need to understand in what situations and positions is this pattern going to be advantageous and when is it not going to be advantageous so we don't make a subject? Okay, we have general rule of thumb that we learned. We have knowledge that we learn about the game that helps us, but in each position is always different. There's an old saying. I think it was Confucius is that you never step into the same river twice. The water is always moving. It's a different river than it was before and the same thing in chest. So even though we may get familiar positions that we are, we're used to and we usually know what the best to do. We always want to reevaluate the situation a new and that way, if you have chest knowledge, you could figure out this is kind of a waste of move. We should put our bishop on a better square, For example, they could put their bishop on, um, he too, and get ready for castling. Okay, really? The same enumerated last some room for the night on you seven and then move it over to G six is just the most logical thing to do with this night. And then it gets out of the way so we can develop our pieces. So we're gonna get leave this tension here in the center. Okay, Over, night out. Actually, before we knew that forgot one step, they move the bishop about eat you. The next thing we want dio want to notice. Actually, this pawn is only defended a one piece now. So actually, once we play night too, C six year white actually can't with visual yet virtually forced to put the night here and to defend its pollen. Otherwise we would just win upon. So why again has to be very careful. They don't accidentally overlook the fact that this plan is that defended enough time. So now it is dependent of times are really the same thing. To be forward to your queen out, Amy and both had to be to pawn and at the four Ponts. Very natural. We're doing three things with this queen developing a piece to an active square and we're putting pressure on two different points and positions to great use of the queen. And there's not much that white could do about it, except to defend everything. OK, and only next we do the other move thing for White do here, of course, is they only have two defenders on this, Paul in the night and on, we now have three Attackers, is to move this night to be three. And now they have four defenders because the night was blocking the queen. We have not offending along all these other pieces and that unblocked the bishop. Another bishop can move and come down to any of you squares a bishop even go to e three, providing an additional defense on this pond, which may seem like overkill. But there actually is a principle in chest cold of over protection, which means that if we but so many pieces on a certain square to defend it, it discourages the opposition from attacking us for anymore. And there's no point in me. But you want a bunch of pressure on this square. If it's five piece funny, it will make me after you switch my attention to something else. Okay, However, you'll notice that once you move this night now this part here is hanging and we would just win upon by going there, and the night would have to have to move, so can't quite do it yet. I was gonna be careful when we move a piece. What changes in the position? Every time a piece, something changes. So this case, we defend this pond extra times, but we look this piece. Hey, so this case blinds going thinking OK, maybe now I want to move this pond down. This is a national thing for White to do is transposing Teoh version of the advance variation. And then maybe we do whatever we're gonna do. You in all move and then he makes out. So in Chester got really careful of the move order. And before you do anything you want to check to make sure that you're not going to be making a mistake somewhere else on the boards, really good habit to get into. And now if that is the way that this position played out, then now they have pressure on this on here, but we can simply move our night over and again. We're not worried about them taking its notice. If they take this yes, we can, uh, taken trade are good, Bishop. This is our strong bishop. Which do you like? That would be a bad idea for us. However, our bishop wasn't even developed. It had even moved yet. And this night has moved multiple times. And so, by doing this, yes, they get the bishop hair, which is good for white. But now look at the better. Defend this pond. We have two Attackers, and they don't have any good way to defend it. Basically, the video, something kind of awkward like this. Like they defend it by putting their queen right here. Okay, Now they have two defenders. But now we have a target that we can focus on so we can do a couple things whenever you find a new target. You think? Okay. How can I win that piece? Or Thai White's pieces down? So they have to defend it. One thing we could simply do is Castle and play F six. So let's just look at this variation in this is something common that could easily happen. So they're defending up on now. They've got the bishop pair by trading off our good bishop. What seems like a good thing for white, but they have to defend decision. And we haven't castle yet. So now black. We are headed development. We've castle AARP on Jane is good. We don't have any targets. We don't have any weaknesses. Except, of course, the usual French weakness. This light sport, which that's our one weakness, which is again Why were always basically looking to try to trade that piece. Okay, now notice. Since whites queen is not blocking in this bishop, it's not so easy for him to develop and castle at this point, it makes sense for him to Fionn Keto, the bishop. So this is a thing that happens in the French defence or any good game where you are dictating the opening that you're dictating the game. So why is reacting to us? He put his queen here in order to defend this square. And so he thought he was doing something good by getting the bishop air. But we basically just transferred one advantage over into a new invention and they continue to have but weakness that we are targeting. So it makes sense now for White to do something like this, get ready to feel Keto, and we're just gonna keep putting pressure on this part. Now we want to look to see what happens if you go here. This might not be a good thing to Dio, because if he takes it, we're getting rid of his weaknesses Target that we just talked about, but notice we now have a strong center. Okay, We have a very strong center. This pond is defended and he can get his bishop out now and do a couple things to us, but it won't make a difference. Like, for example, you can gain a tempo by attacking our queen, and we can simply do something like this. But we here now we've got a very strong center. It's a typical thing that you get the French offense and they keep coming up in every single of these lectures. Oftentimes, the natural variation of trades will leave black with a strong center and a better pawn chain. White still is not castle yet. Okay, people feeling kinda, we will finally get our bishop developed, and pretty much any point we can push this pond down if we want to. And there are plenty of things that we could do. Finally, Whitely were castle and noticed. Since we have, we have to semi open files, see file and the F file of someone open because we have no pawn on them, even the White House upon of them. So that these air potential targets for us as well So we can put both of our rooks on these open files. Another good thing about the French defence. When you make that on push on the sea file, you'd actually want to put a reference see one, as I've been saying and then same thing on the F body of these two natural places to put rooks. Our position flows very naturally. Now we have the choice. We double of our rooks here on the F. I'll organise have one roof on each. I'm gonna look at what happens if we double our Brooks here. Now we're aiming down here. We can't do anything with this yet, but this could lead to some potential tactics later on. You know what could do a few different things here? They don't really gain anything in that position. You can attack our look just back, so that's not have anything to worry about. Remember, don't worry about individual moves just make sure that you look at your opponent's best news. Look at anything that they could do and then calculate several news ahead from that is checked to make sure everything's fine. And you have nothing to worry about why it's gonna try to continue to develop. It makes a lot of sense for White to develop the strip right here and aim it down. Queen. They could try to generate some tactics to the fact that the roof is aimed across from our queen. This is generally a good thing to do, and chest has put a rook or other piece across from Queen, even if their pieces in between, there may be a way for you to open up and cause a threat by having that happen. So, for example, if in the next move white pushes pond down, we can't take it because we'd lose our queen, and then he can look to weaken our center by trading, forcing us to trade with this pond, and now we would have an isolated pawn and therefore a target, So we would want to stop that happening. So initially, when we see are gonna make a move like this The first thing I want to think about it. Okay? This is a threat. His pawn to C four is a threat. What are we going Teoh do about that one thing that we might think Is that Okay? Well, what if I play? If I right now, now, I can't play c four because of this move. Retract the bishop. And even though we can't might take it because of this pin, he can't take it either. He's gonna have to move it down somewhere. And our center is defended well, and it's quite strong. And so this is a very difficult position for White to play their cramped. We have more space. And even though the material is equal, Black has a very, very strong winning position. Is a typical thing that you will see again in the fresh defense. Multiple different ways. Toe. When we call that Optionality and Optionality something in all strategic games or in life such as a business and investing, you wanna have often now just multiple ways to win. And the French offense is a typical offensive. Provides a lot of optionality lots of different ways to when you can win from getting material you can win having stronger center, he would have more space and you wouldn't be better upon chain endgame is multiple ways to win and even though the really strong player that's like can get a good position that gets black in the French defence is just as I've been saying, more awkward to play, it's more challenging and it is easier to make a mistake, especially getting blitz. So that's enough for this lesson. We're gonna look at another variation of the terror ash opening variation in the next lesson. 6. Lesson 5 The Tarrasch Variation Pawn Gambit: So in this lesson, we're gonna look at the tear Ash variation again. And I'm gonna show you guys what can happen if a white makes some unpredictable moves or play a sharper line where Being sort of Bierhoff course earlier than expected. Obviously, when we're playing chess on the Internet, random people, it always will be making the same moves that we see in these videos. And so we want to look at lots of different scenarios and see what is likely to happen in the different situations and knowing how to deal with this. Another common thing that could happen in the terrorist opening is after they play 92. But you are typical thing of getting are playing policy five. They play the policy three to defend we get our night out. Don't take is continue to pressure on it as we know instead of, um, they're gonna get their night out notice. Last time we played not G 1987 immediately. Right here. White can actually take this pawn enough because we blocked the take back with our bishop. This is a pretty common thing that happens in several different openings where we allow them to take this pond and notice it in the Queen's gambit and lots of other gambit lines. And what happens is we gained some tempo, and even though we give them upon, we get some nice counter place. So now we're ahead and development they put upon and often square. So either we're gonna get the pawn back on the next move because it's normally easy way to defend it or we are going to make them make some awkward. So, for example, if they go here there pawn to defend it this way, this is not necessarily weakest for them. Although this pawn here on C three is definitely a potential target for us. A typical thing to do in this situation is to go a five right here. And if you go a five and now, if they couldn't take that now, they have a big problem with their paws. And even though we're down upon, we're gonna have some nice play and we have better development. We have more active pieces, and this is a situation where we made a pawn sacrifice, and we've gotten a lot of activity out of it, so it wouldn't be very smart Flynn to take that. Now if they do something like this and they defend that bond that upon that creates a pin on the rook is a typical pattern that you'll see in lots of different positions. Again, the queen's gambit comes to mind. See something? Someone. We could take this part now and they can't take this pawn yet because they would lose the roof because of the pin. And if they take back with this pawn, we can also go ahead and take it. What a night they still can't captured. They would lose a rook. So you she's a nice tactics become possible once they try to defend that pawn in such a fashion. So this is something you'll see a lot. So don't worry. If you go to here and you go, Oh, no. If I move my knight to E seven, this ponds are defended, I'll lose it. You don't want to make a substance. You want a copy? Okay, let's say I give up on up a movement out. I'm attacking it, and then they defend it. Get to calculate several moves into the future to see what will happen. Don't make assumptions and Jessica Open news upon bad. Gonna look at every possible trade and get a feel for Am I gonna be able to get something out of that? You're gonna get a dynamic position where you have a lot of threats and better development than White does. Once again, this is a great thing about the French defence. Most roads lead to game. It's easier to play in decisions that are easier to make means less calculation. It means a more solid structure and just a game overall. That's easier to win, especially in bliss. Okay, now you can say, Well, they don't have to play this pond city. Take this. We go here instead of defending of the pond they defend it with this night right here. But still, it's tying down their pieces to try to defend this pond. Notice supports by moving the night over there. Just that we saw the last scenario. This pawn is now hanging. Yes, they could treat on queens. We don't really care about that. They have a target and they have a worse pawn structure. They've gotta do something like this and we have a better game in the U now. We've got a strong center. This is a weird pawn structure, and that may make you think that is bad. But this is a stronger center than white has. White has no ponds in the center. Even though this looks kind of weird. Black has a much better position. We could take a bishop out, still have pressure on this pond. We can castle, and we've got the strong sand. It's not easy for White to attack. They're gonna have to do something kind of awkwardly. Bishop, Just right here again. They're not gonna want to make a check on us Causality. Helping us get rid of our battleship. We would welcome any check. A temple thing that we could do in a situation like this is to blockade this pond and turn it into a fixed target. We don't want we don't let them push forward and try to figure out a way to trade it off. So well, develop. This night will block upon, and then we will turn it into a target later. We could leave it there for now. Both sides with the castle. We'll get our bishop out, maybe do something like this logical thing to do. We will castle and notice. We've got a much, much better position than White because we've got a strong the export bishop. And even though this lights where Bishop is still kind of weak because it's blocked in right now due to our center, I mean at some point we can push this pawn forward and we'll have a strong center. It's another example of a pawn chain. It appears weak, but it really isn't. Let's say you something logical here. Like they put their plan, their budgets here notice they can put their mission when he three, because of our farms, we could push this upon forward is a show. You will happen if they suddenly goes. Now we have a really, really dangerous, advanced Paul situation. They've got it back up. And this is really bad for White. You do not want to have this kind of situation where we have a policy for lots of space to move. Our peace is very, very dangerous. Okay, so basically, the white bishop is forced to go right here and notice how they're constricted. Well, their bishops are just kind of on these passive squares. The other nights or out. They're not really doing anything. This night is tied down to defending this pawn. Now we could do something that we can push this pawn forward. And even though it looks like the weakest notices defended by two pieces, it guards both of these squares. So whereas a moment ago, why could potentially be bring its night down here toe before If you got the opportunity right now, he really can't doing these pieces are restricted. You're gonna who is rip over and stuff. And we just have a much, much better position, and it's easier to play. Okay, that's just an example of what would happen if this went down a different variation. Okay, so French offense has a lot of ways of getting a good position. So White does not want to take that pot. So don't be afraid right here. When we play this movie night to e seven of them, taking the pond lead to a really fun position for us to play easy position for them to play . So instead of them taking it, they will be wise. Teoh simply develop there. Peace is okay. There was a Campli. This should be to yet because we could take this part. Okay, so they're gonna have to do something go like this. Remember, They can't do that yet. Very awkward for them. They're gonna defend this part. This is, like, almost always what a good player will do if they put the terror ashes. They got a transposed into the advance creation. It's a logical move because after that, it's part of the longer defenseless, and they can move their nine. So we're going to see these similar lines come up again and again because the moves are just so logical. Now, if the night goes here, sometimes players think, Oh, I'm gonna push upon for even more like this. I'm gonna make him move back. He's got to go back. This actually isn't really a good thing. When you lock the center down like this, it closes off. Ah, lot of the movement of your pieces. So, for example, in this case, since the weakest we have in the French offenses this week, Bishop right here, by forcing this center down, closed down like this, it restricts and moving or even more. For example, when his pond was down here we have the potential to maybe move this pawn forward and move the bishop out. We got the chance to do so and gets, um, some ability for it aimed down here right now. We couldn't do that, but we could have a new her in such a way that we could do that. If he decides if Ian Kettle, then later on we could. But by closing it down, this is really restricting the use of our pieces. And what kind of restricts both sides? This gives white time to do a nice set up, and then eventually maybe move this pawn on the F file down and gain space on the king side . So this would hurt us. We don't want to play this move in the French defence. We want to go ahead and leave this pawn on the C five square hoping that they will either trade it off along with the activator peace with tempo, or that we will have the right time be able to make this trade on D four. Usually that's what will happen if you're playing the French against a good player. Still gonna be out here. We will be looking Teoh trade this pawn off and then we'll have this open file for the bishop will have an open file for this rook. Just a nice, smooth position to play in this case. Where you might see is this movie here. Now you have one too. Three pieces going. Take right here. And we only have two defenders. So if they play this move in this exact position than the logical thing is going to be to do one of two things either do the thing that I just said not to dio, which in this case now is more logical because it blocks in this bishop that was put on the square. Now this move makes a little more sense. We're just going to try to figure out a way to how we're gonna activate this piece. But it may not be which decided, do. The other logical thing to Dio is to go ahead and take right now. And if they take with the bishop now, we have created off one of their good bishops and we have achieved the Bishop air, so this still benefits us. They have a target now in the center. We've got a better pawn structure This is a very common thing to have happened in the French, with some trade happens and we're left this nice pollen structure. And we have the bishop now. And even though our lights where bishop is a weakness, we can activate it or trade it off and then be left with a really strong, dark squared bishop. And they don't have longer have a dark suburban ship. Teoh, fight us. So that would benefit us cake. If they decide not to take it with the chip and do something like this, they think of the night. Now. They have a discovered attack threat on our queen. But we could take this pawn. Okay, notice this ponds offended so they can't move their brookover. And we could be another on this one for this. So I don't see through. So maybe winning material, okay And notice this night is defended. Everything defend. We're not worried about anything. This is a great benefit of French offense. No weaknesses other than this this bishop. It's the only weekends usually. Okay, so that would help us. And then if they took with this piece the other night, same thing 7. Lesson 6 Tarrasch with Best Play: And finally, let's look and see what happens if White makes the best moves and takes the right way. So obviously it's better for him to capture this pawn with the night ready. Go ahead and trade off this night. Because if we leave, we obviously can't leave this queen here because he could make a discovered attack with our queen and threatened us and improve his position. There's only a good place for some Uber queen. We couldn't move it back to here, But I like the idea of trading off this night that he's got in the Senate. This is his most active piece. So whenever you could trade up on a year more passing pieces of his most activities, that benefits you. And so when we trade this off, his best move is going to be to take back with the ponds. Let's just look at that. So we take here, he takes back with upon now, he's got a pretty good center and things looked at their pretty equal, but notice he still hasn't been ableto castle yet. What we're gonna want to do here is we're gonna want to get our bishop out with the check in order for us to Castle and he they're gonna have toe block it with his night, which means that he's gonna be putting in a passive pin position or go ahead and trade up. His bishop was probably is what most people will dio. And we're fine with this trait because we are going to castle. And if he says, you know what, I was going to trade off this piece. We get to take back with a check, and he might just trying to start trading on those pieces. Notice we have a big trade like this again for the point of view of Black who moves second in the game and the gold opening being to take the initiative for White. This has already been a success. We have taken the initiative from White, and so this open has already been success. But we'll see what happens if we continue to play it if he decides to put his queen here. Of the best thing to do usually is to avoid trading queens. Unless you have some sort of advantage going into an endgame, I would say Keep your clean on the board, especially if you assess yourself being a better player of your higher rated player going to compete in the board because then your, uh, in theory, superior skill will have a higher probability of playing out. We have more pieces to play, especially when you have the quick sold and just tuck it back into here. And then white will try to Castle. Thank you. Something moves pond down. We just make his night with back. It's fine. Get our bishop out, develop art pieces. He'll get his bishop out, and then we'll get our look over on that square there on the sea file of the national thing he finding castles and then key move once again is we're gonna play F six just like we did before it undermines their center. Notice that our night an opponent 30 tickets pond and there's no way to defend it. Very well, said. Removing the queen over here like this, which you could dio or what a lot of people will do is they'll play an F four here and offended palling with another pond, so we're not gonna want to take that right away. But he also is not gonna want to take our plants. We gain yourself a little bit of space for a moves and any point in the future again, we're the ones where the choice to take right here and force him to react to us. Another thing about this position is we have a clearly inferior bishop. Still it still blocked in by our own ponds. And so what we're gonna wanna dio is look for a way to trade it off. So after he defends this pawn here with this pawn F four move, we're gonna threaten to trade its bishop off for this night. This night, for him is a good, active peace. And our bishop is a very passive piece. So if he allows us to trade this be a big win for us. So for example, let's say he just says, Okay, I'm going to move my rook over and I'm gonna allow this trade to happen. Notice If he takes our room, we could take back. It's just just a normal trade, so we don't have to force the trade. We just leave her roots as they are. It's fine if we take this night now they double their poems and got one of our worst piece , so that would be a really big win for us at this stage of the game. Of course, would probably wouldn't want to do that. Look, there's nowhere else for the night to go candidacy for, and he can't go to either of these squares on a five C five because of our pumps. So he would have to put his night back here on C one and blocking his own, wrote This would be really passive and a bad position for White have. All of a sudden we've got a way better game than him, and we successfully activated our worst piece. And even if we need to move this back, let's see, for example, he's gonna move pollen forward toe, make us back up our piece. Actually, in this case, putting the bishop on E eight wouldn't be such a bad moves. We've got lots of different choices here in different things that we can do. We can look, do something like reroute this night two h four and then back to F five. Put in a nice, centrally located position of one option. Look to see what happens if we do trade this Paul enough here in the center. Looks like probably just give us some parity. Some symmetry which notice they will want. Another thing wanted to look at doing. Especially since his night is in this position is what if we do something like this, we can drop are looking here on the seventh rank. Threaten this queen. A rook is defended. He's not to move the queen somewhere. Okay, so So he loses somewhere the center. Normal. Move. Now we can get our look out. And now we have to Brooks on this see file, which is really a powerful thing, even though they could make our bishop move back. Doesn't matter. Rookies defended. We have in total control of this see file. We could put our bishop back here. Now it's aimed at this open file because we played F six. So our bishop is a pretty active piece. Our roots are dominating the sea file, and we've got a much better position than White. White is very passive here. And this resulted from us understanding the dynamic of having a week Bishop, we can penetrate it off. What it has to avoid that trade. Otherwise, we're gonna get some sort of an advantage By avoiding that trade, this scenario had to put his piece and really bad spot. And now we have a position of dominance and so this is something that we'll have it a lot in the French defence, but also just having chest knowledge. Knowing which pieces are weaker and stronger helps you to make a lot of really smart strategic decisions. And so we utilized the knowledge of having a week bishop, and then we also utilize this open C Square to get our books on it and having a look. Not only these two groups controlling this file, but having a look on the seventh rank is considered very dangerous. Later on, we could kind of double up our roofs, a rook on D to if we could get our other look down here. It's super dangerous because now we're threatening everything on the second rank right here says we're turning out into being a very dangerous position for White. What's the money This night we routed as quickly as possible and try to trade on these routes, and then we're going to be trying to prevent that. Everyone trying to get our pieces and to better squares. One thing we could do. Baby is gonna queen down here now, which I support these Brooks. And he's gonna wanna try to trade off these pieces. Now we will have taken through food takes we don't. We want to avoid a big trade. So, for example, we go like this. Trade, trade, trade. Trade is definitely help us. It relieves the pressure with ones that are applying pressures. We want to avoid trades. However, they do a good job of forcing a trade. Okay, maybe we let them take our roof right here and we drop another rubdown. We're not going, Teoh, initiate the trade. Were simply going to look to improve our pieces and look to do something good. So, for example, we could put our bishop here Now, which puts a pin on this night. Can't move if he takes our ruk now. Yes, we're allowing one trade, but we've dropped a rook into here and now this night is pinned. We have two pieces. Are bishop and a roof aimed at this Bishop. And so the white team is trying to untangle. And there's lots of things we could do for example now he is also going to lose this palm. If he does something like this, there's tickets route we could simply gain upon, take upon. And then if he says, Well, I'm still gonna try to trade everything, often our winning pond And we still have pressure here. Okay? So again, we have a better position. We're probably going to win the game. So that's another way of this game. Could easily play out where we would be getting the advantage. And the next lesson will look at one final variation that I think would be instructive for us to look at. And that is that if we take right here with the pond and then they take with their night and we decide not to take back, for example, we can take this part here and gain upon they get a threat of us gets really complicated. So we want to build a look and see. Okay, what do we do in this type of situation? Next lesson 8. Lesson 7 All Variations Win for Black: I just want you guys one final variation to look and see. What if we decide not to trade? It's not like we did in last variation. What happens that this shows us that in every single variation, every single possible scenario we end up with a better positions in this case, we can simply gain upon. And there's nothing I could do. We were worried about this discovered attack and have sniping. It will take something in our queen, but notice if he goes ahead and takes his pond friends working when we can actually just capture that night back with Queen, we'd be winning a whole timepiece. We can't do that if he tries to do something like attack our queen by moving his night back here. The problem with this is we can take his night with check. He has to take back, and then we can move our queen. So what we did was we gain is Polynice that are really important set upon that now is gonna give us a big advantage because we have a really strong following chain and a strong center and they're missing pollens and the centers. This is a big advantage for Black, especially after only a few moves in the game. And so this is a scenario again, where we're worried about. If we recognize this discovered attack, this night can attack basically anything. And the bishop will be attacking our queen. But we don't want to make it something. OK, that's gonna be dangerous and bad about what we want to calculate. We notice. Okay, Can take that. You can't go there. I mean, you could do something like this and threaten our queen, and then we see Look, it okay? Is he threatening anything? It's not defended, No. And so we simply have to move our queen out of the way and put on a good square. We can put it here on a five, or we can even simply move it all the way back to the eight, which is a perfectly fine place to put. Our queen and we gained upon were able to win this pawn. And now this night has to move because it's it's being threatened and he can't take anything. He's a deceptive move, is his night back, which actually just made him waste a move. Basically. And now we are upon the good position again. We're not worried about this check coming down. We will then the lab, the trade off, this bishop and a lot of lower little players will go ahead and make that check because they see check patter, sees Jack Pastor, Please check having a lot, so that's fine. And there's another lesson that comes out of this is the idea that you always defend your pieces. You don't leave pieces hanging than tactics like the one that we just stop this discovered attack. From this night, it can't gain anything. There's nowhere that I can go to attack another piece. After we move our queen, everything is defended, and there's a saying in Chester, Stay loose pieces drop off and lower rated players. We tend to make moves and leave our pieces under banded or kind of like weird squares. And that opens up possibilities for your opponents. Notice that strong chess players they oftentimes they win simply because they don't have weaknesses and they don't leave their positions open to tactics. And then you just sort of applied chest principles over the course of the game to gain some Spain's to get its strong center. If you make it advantageous trade, you know your bad dishes for their good bishop that we saw in previous lesson. And all of a sudden you got a winning position and all you have to do is not making mistakes. And this is the way that Magnus Carlsen, who's the world champion right now. This is the way he defeats other super grandmasters. He's doesn't make any mistakes. He knows that This is very, very well, is doing nothing that they're his opponents could do to him. And then you sort of, like, grinds them down and eventually the Chicken Little error or they make a bunch of like, slightly Inaki removed and he was gets a better position and then he wins. He basically wins by attrition. I'm not making any mistakes. And so it's a really powerful lesson for us tournament players, people that are studying the game. It's a really important thing to think about, and this is a good little example of how even though there's a potential threat here, none of our pieces air hanging and we just basically win a pond so every single way explicit this position we would gain by taking this pawn here on the four. It's just good times. We don't fear this move coming down here. If we don't take this pawn that they can capture our pond, we force this part or have been closed position down even further weakened our lights for Bishop. So in this case, go ahead and take. And we're not worried about what they do because we've seen through a calculation that any which way they recapture, we're going to get a sizable event. And that has to do with the structure of our ponds in the French defence and the fact that they're, you know, oftentimes have this week on here That is going to be a target. So we saw that the best way for them to move forward was a tank back with this pond. But then we have plenty of good moves and other things that we can do to help our position out and we saw were dictated. Play were castling. We don't have any weaknesses. Everything is fine. Okay? So go ahead and feel confident to play against the terrorist defense. You will see that one often. That's the one where we're looking at now at the 92 year and next were to look at some of the other popular lines 9. Lesson 8 Intro to the Winawer Variation: and now we're going to look at another variation. This is called the Winner, and it's one that's probably most often played at the elite levels by the grandmasters because considered to be the best way to play against the French defence as white. But you really have to know what you're doing so you don't make any mistakes. Obviously, the grandmasters know what they're doing. And so they play this with confidence. They go ahead and they just play night to see three. Like No, Remember, we looked very briefly in the very first, uh, intro lesson. If we go ahead and take this pawn here like takes back what is very comfortable position and this is a normal type of position where whites gonna maintain a slight edge of slight initiative and black has passed. So we don't want to do that, Okay, We're not gonna want trade there, and we also don't necessarily want to use Emilie Play c five here, although we can do it. What usually happens is we will go ahead and play the bishop out. Teoh, before we put a pin in this nine now are threatening to take this pawn. And if why it makes a mistake like a loose cannon. This is always gonna miss Bishop, Will. They made a mistake here because we can trade the night and then went upon. So that does happen. Even though that's very bad play, they do that. We usually will happen. A good player here. We'll go ahead and play this pond down and be kind of transposed into a version of the advanced variation when we have it in advance. Variation with night on seat three instead of his pond coming to see three. So it does change everything pretty much. And then we're gonna want to continue with our same thing. We want to get in C five. Here is the whole point of the French offenses that were counterattacking on the queen side . And we're getting space for pieces on the queen side to come out and yes, later. We're still probably going to play F six depending. Where are Does we really need to get this move here? C five and we take our nine out and put it on C six. We have a very closed position. Is his bishop is even weaker than normal. We wanna play see. Okay, now that they do threaten our bishop here we go ahead usually and just penetrated off. But we do not want to make the street. We trade again. Now, the whole point of training off the bishop is for them to have a weakness over here. Similar to in the names Oh, India Defense. We trade off. Our bishop will give them the bishop air in order to mess up their ponds and have a pawn weakness in a very, very clear target for us, too. Trading off this on now, we would get rid of that. So defeat the purpose of what we just did. Trading away the bishop. It's always be cognizant of that. You know what it is that you're doing Were trading off ambition, pair of giving something away in order to give something. So course we want to maintain that weakness, that we created a whole point of the opening, so we wanted simply defend this pawn. He's not gonna want to trade it off and leave really, really bad conscience. So basically, he's gonna leave this pond here, hoping that we take it So you something really simple. Like this queen to see seven. We can also play Queen a five here. But then he put his bishop here across Queen and then creates a threat. So that's never a good thing to do. We will simply put our queen here on si seven. And some point in future, we may be able to trade this and then have a threat down here. So this is a good natural place for our queen to go. And also another thing that we're gonna want to Dio is gonna want to put this scenario. We're gonna want to try to trade off our dark squared bishop for their Excuse me. Our lights were bishop of their lightsquared. Bishop. I mentioned before this is sometimes something we could do, and I'll show you here how we could do it. So they just some normal like they want to get their nine out in Castle, which the smart thing to do in this case when their queen side ponds air are messed up like this. We're gonna play the three, and then we're gonna try to get our bishop over. Here's for example. They get their bishop out. You too. And then we merely look to force history. We haven't moved our night yet. And so they go ahead and take it. We can take back with the night and we just got rid of our only weakest. This would be a nice victory to get rid of our weakness and have the film Wilpons. The thing that White has going for them is that they have the bishop pair. And, um So by trading off their bishop here and getting rid of a week, Bishop, we would have a good position. It is not much that they can do about this. They can't move their bishop. And you wearing castle is a castle. Well, then we go ahead and succeed with trade, and this is very nice. And again, we're not going to want to trade this pond. We're gonna leave this here, and that's probably gonna stay that way Long time. This is going to be the centre aspect of the position is how to resolve this issue in the Senate with the ponds as difficult. White have to be very, very careful, just like all the other positions in the French defence. Now let's see what happens, though, if y tries to avoid this trade been doing something like like it's pawn now. Well, it doesn't work because it's only defended by one bishop piece and something. We simply take it. You simply take this part and just kind of complicated. Maybe now, well, it allows them to trade off this pawn here, but they lose upon and we have a good position coming. It doesn't help them. We could do lots of different stuff, and, you know, we just want upon. Okay, so this would be very great for Black have happened. So there's nothing to do about. You basically have to trade off this, Bishop. So it's something that if you're a white player playing the French, you would want to look at this of a few moves earlier and say Okay, if they're gonna try to move his pawn forward right here, that play B six, you're gonna recognize Okay, the next move, they can play Bishop to a six. Haven't I avoid that? One way is to fianca Bishop. Now, if we go here and try to trade, they can avoid the trade getting heading their bishop. But notice because our bishop is in a position that it's in white cannot cast you cannot Castle cross check, right. And so now it's It's tricky. They had to try to figure out a way to Castle can't Castle Queen side because you miss of their ponds and this is awkward. So again, it's another example in the French defence of how it was kind of awkward for white. What do we do to avoid this? So right at this point right here White knows they're doing. They're going to see the potential for us to play B six and trade off our bishop. This is what having chest knowledge does for you. So instead of playing Knight to F three here, why it is going to get the bishop out first so that if they try to play this move, they can move it out of the way. For example, a Super division here we go ahead and try to get on fish about. We got to think of a way. How can we, um, avoid and see if there is a way that we can afford it? Actually, the best way would be simply to play the night to be to first when we play B six and then they can feeling cut of the bishop. Because if we go here now, they can feel in Quetta wit, and they can also castle. But even though we could not get an opportunity to trade off, they're strong Bishop for our week, Bishop. Like we wanted Teoh. Well, we still get to trade off or Bad Bishop, at least for one of their pieces. So this is still be something good for us. So now White still has the Bishop pair. And did you have a good, strong bishop in this white PCs? Nice and feeling. Keto. We have this weakness of these ponds here, and we don't have any weaknesses in our position. We can activate our nights. We confined against this lights where, Bishop, and we get a good gay. Okay, we might want to simply castle here. White may do something like this and tried to gate space. Notice that the field, this position, it's quite different than some of the other ones that we have looked at. But the structure of the French defence ponds is still the same, or King is still very, very solid and safe. We still have this situation here where we're going, Teoh, open up at some point in the right moment, see? File or open up at some point in the red moment, The F file. Okay, so the themes remain. Even though the position is different, the pieces are all in different squares. White position. It's totally different in the sense that they have feeling kind of their bishop and everything like that. We saw the same themes of place, so we know what it is that we want to do. Okay, so say whiteness is something natural. Develops This starts with Bishop here defends this pawn weaken simply mover Brookover which gets it out of the way of a threats. Visit trade in the center here from this Lightsquared Bishop, for example. White, We want to push this pond down in order. Teoh, try Teoh, get rid of this weakness. But it doesn't quite work. Because in this situation we can trade off this pawn. And then we went on. You take a screen in Queens or we simply you can take this pawn if we want Teoh with this on on the defile and now gain upon this planet. Defended. We have a nice dynamic position in this case, it probably would be better to simply take back with Queen here because if they do, go ahead and trade queens with us, let's say, for example, we just take back with the RUC. They still have Obama's target right here. They've got this weakness to defend on C two, which is the whole point of the opening that we played was for them to have a weakness over here in these Pontes. So even though they were able to trade off with the bonds of the no longer stacked in this case, they're left with a target. And once again, what do you receive? We see a situation where they have got to do something to defend upon. And then we can double up our rooks and take control of the sea file. Very thematic in the French defence, it will happen over and over again. And it's just kind of difficult for white too. Play, They can defend it and they can see to train off pieces. But we are the ones that have this good position Notice actually that Do you play this there? The bishop is hangs so they have to deal with these other issues before they could even deal with this. So right now, this bishop is hanging and this pawn is hanging. So it is a very tricky situation for, like, to deal with the base is gonna have to lose his pawn because no way, for his vision, possible move. And for this point, the defendant is no peace. I could defend pulled this bishop response. Now they're going to simply lose material, and we're going to win the game. We don't make any mistakes. Okay? So just another example of how are nice pawn structure and our lack of weaknesses. Everything is harmonious in the French defence. Everything is working together for us, and we just have one easy decision to make after another. Okay, so we're gonna win this game. We don't make a giant blunders, and next lesson will look at a different variations of the win over to see how else we could gain an advantage 10. Lesson 9 The Winawer Pawn Exchange Variation: and I want to show you guys what happens if we play the winner? Where? Variation. And then they decide to actually just trade off our pond. So let's say we were going to the French defence and then we play are no move, you five. They played night to see three first, okay? And we get the bishop out in this case, right? They have to play you five here, right? Otherwise lose upon. So it's good play and then we player, normally five, let's say, in this case, it says immediately forcing this trade or putting the question to the bishop. As we say, they go ahead and just say, I'm gonna take this pot, okay? Because of course, some players will do this and then all of a sudden, everything you just learned in the course, all those variations, we went over all of a sudden kind of useless. Well, if this doesn't happen, this is good for you because the structure is even better than any other variations. You're going to have an easy time playing this game and in the French defence, and we basically taken initiative away from white. Why is that? Well, we traded a C paan for a central plant case or just in theory, we've already does something good. White has given us one of their center ponds, which helps maintain strength in the center for are on on the sea file, which is not as good. So this is one reason why it's illogical to make this trade. Seconding it did was a lot of to activate Our strong bishop. Never are good. Bishop is a bishop. It's on the opposite color, most of our ponds. This is why the French defence the lights word Bishop is the week bishop. It's blocked in by a pond so therefore by definition, are dark. Prohibition is a stronger one is activated on this very nice diagonal. And you know, I mean, why could do something like try to trade off this bishop? And all we have to do is back it up. It's still very active, and even though it's not as nice, Dagnall White basically wasted a move that puts upon here on the edge, which is very dangerous, and it doesn't actually get him anything. And the next thing we knew something like, put your check, threaten him, they could go back. It's a waste of other words. Okay, so this is a good thing for us now. Also, White has this pond to defend, as we've seen in many of the other variations. And so he may do something like take his night out to defend his pawn. We will go ahead and get our night out so he does the other amateur thing and he makes this pain on the nights we will get our bishop to a square that's better than where it waas and then see castles. And now we're going to focus our game on this pump. So we'll put our night here. He may do something like this and try to continue to defend upon. So he's defending this pawn, but two pieces rook in this night. And now we can move our night over an attack it with two pieces and just generally pressure . We've got an active bishop. We've got a really good pawn chain. We've got a stronger center and it doesn't make sense for him to. Maybe he's thinking, OK, well, we've got two nights here that are attacking this pond is trade one off and now there's less of a threat to that point. But he's trading off his good lengths word Bishop and giving us the bishop pair. And so, all this sudden, not only do we have the Bishop pair, maybe we're not gonna win this pond right away, even though it's still a target. But now this bishop is all of a sudden a really good piece. Noticed. Like if we do something like this and the next move were able to move our pawn forward here , for example, just a white or something. This tax or queen, people get over. This is, Let's just say we can do something just to show you guys like this which are thrown forward now these bishops really powerful pieces. Is this lights where bishops aim down here towards their king? Bold. These bishops working together like this are controlling a lot of squares. This white knight really has nowhere to go. You can go to a really passive position by going e two or another equally pass additional on going Teoh, be one otherwise OK. He can put his night here in the center where it's not really doing anything, and all of a sudden we have a really good position with really active pieces, and we can castle the next move. And this is a really great game for us now. We don't necessarily want to play this move upon two d four. It's just an example of showing you how easy it is to activate what was once our weakest peace, making it all of a sudden, active, strong piece. So notice here that black is getting a really good gay. Now they don't shoot out. The lights were Egypt because they realize they want to keep that piece on the board. They're going to have to worry about this pawn for the rest. Uh, the game. Okay. One thing that might do is say I'm going over. Protect that upon that we talked about in the last lecture, which is a perfectly smart thing to do. Only problem is, it sucks that they have to do it. We don't have to over protect anything. All our pieces are working together harmoniously, as we now know, because I've been beating it into your guys his head. Throughout this whole entire course, the only weakest we have is this life squared, bishop, which we can just basically try to trade off at any point in the game. Let's say that, um, why do something smart and trying to trade on our active bishop peace with their piece that was not developed yet. In this case, we don't want to trade it. What will simply do just back it up? Keep our good active piece on the board and Amy right here. It's totally fine. They can no longer try to threaten Italy Going here. Notice we've got the queen in the Bishop. We just want peace. We just take it. Knight takes take night. That doesn't work. They cannot take that, Bishop. And the next thing that we can do is say, for example, that you something take their lookout built that now we can threaten to trade off this bishop. And in fact, by putting their bishop here, they blocked the defensive this pond we could actually win upon. Now, we would win this pawn in this situation so they wouldn't want to do that move that I just show you. Which is another reason why having weakness here having a target that you have to defend makes your position tricky. Complicated because you're constantly watching at any time you make a piece that blocks your defenders or move to a bad square, then all of a sudden you're losing material. So actually, this bishop move here wouldn't even were basically the only basing develop this Bishop to is gonna take two moves to feel head. Oh, it or put it on D two right here, which is a pretty passive place for to be. Yes, they can get the RUC out. They have toe untangle themselves. In the meantime, Weaken threatened to trade off our lights where Bishop, which they you know, shouldn't want to dio. So they made back their pieces up. And once again, we see that we are dictating the playing and we are in the driver's seat. We might do something like this, play a six so that they no longer can move this bishop down here. That we can put this night back on C six and continue to threaten this plant now for patient and chest. We don't necessarily need to try to win that piece right away. Just the fact that we have our eyes on it and are pressuring it. It forces whites plate, we have to defend it. They have to think about each move they make, being in harmony with the other pieces that are defending this piece where we don't have to do that. We have created a weakness and we're posing the weakest at this point. That strategic thing to Dio is and they mentioned several lessons ago is we want to create a second weekends and chest. We have principle of two weaknesses. So we have one weakness that we are threatening right now, we want to create a second weakness. Okay. And so that's we're gonna do is we're gonna focus on this part of the focus on creating a second week. It's And then, in the meantime, just remember that at any point we can play this move F six right here because f six, even if though it allows them to get rid of his weakness, we see what we saw before. It gives us this really strong centre Paul instruction and very, very difficult for white to do anything about. So say, for example, whiteness. Something logical. Like he plays 98 4 here to threaten our bishop and, um tried Teoh get this pawn moving forward. Maybe trying to get some space. We can do two things we can put a rush of all the way down here. Remember again? He can't put this bishop here and threatened Triggs Way went upon. That's probably a good thing to do or after calculation. If we decide it's better to put our bishop back here on you to also find this might be better in this case because we're planning on playing F six at some point. Let's just say, for example, he does something like this and we have sex. So now he might think, great. I get rid of this weakness. I don't defend anymore. But look what we have done now. Now we have active bishops. We've got a strong poem center, which we saw before, and there's really nothing that I could do. And he did you a couple little tactical things like this. But see, okay, in this case, he would be able to win. That part's really, really careful that we don't allow him to do that right away. So we do want to take back with the RUC. I am, Do you think upon? But she was gonna weird because we have an open square foot of the King. But notice now we have three central ponds. Night can't come down because we have this bishop defending it, and we're going to push this forward, and we're gonna create some threats. So just say I was going to show you something. Random move from white. Now, once we push this pot here, this is a very, very strong position for Black. It's a winning position, but we have a lot of space. We have activated all of our pieces, except for this rook and everything is smooth. Okay, so it's just another way that we're going to win if we understand the dynamics of the French defence. Okay. And that was an example of what happens if white besides to trade off this pond on notice. It just one time little move, one tiny little trade. But all of a sudden it affects the direction that the whole entire position flows toward. Okay, Thanks, Hayes. This is one little thing, and it changes everything about the position, but notice as well that even though that one little move changes the position so much for Black. We have the same advantages in the same things. We still have the really strong pollen structure. We saw this good bishop. You still have the open sea file, and we still have the themes of pressuring their center and playing up six at some point. So no matter how you slice it, if you get good at playing the French defence, you're gonna get a really strong position, no matter what your opponent does, even if you're playing against a grand master. Now, as you go deeper into the game, they're gonna be making better moves and probably wrench the position from you. But in the very beginning, there's not much they can do against you. Okay, so that's a really good example. Just showing you this is why we don't usually want to take is pulling here for why wouldn't try to keep our center structure intact. And because of that, we're going to be playing defense, which is not what White wants to do. The next lesson we're gonna look at more common grand master level play and the widower Variation 11. Lesson 10 The Winawer with Best Play: So they said. Now we're gonna look to see what is the best player you're playing. It's strong opposition. What is going usually happen. What is that gonna look like on the board? What usually happens if you're a strong chess player is since you know what, The week of positions are you going to have windows that oftentimes that means not being impatient, not making trades and not looking for a lot of dynamism and activity. The very good You want to develop into a nice position, get your king tucked away for your pieces on active squares and not have any weaknesses. A new position. So let's look to see what will probably happen if you play against someone who really knows how to play against the French. So the plane I'm missing, three will play their 25. But instead of playing a three here or trading there, simply gonna develop their pieces right? There are no rush. They're gonna defend this pawn. We're into the same thing. We think our night out to sea six, we normally would There is gonna continue to defend it, right? They have to be defending it so they could get a bishop out now we can get a night out or we can get our we Now it's up to us. Which way we want to play on Want has changed the move. Order a little bit here just to show you how another. Another way to play. It would be instead of immediate playing queen to be six. So you get a night out, Quite simply, castles. We simply castle. They developed a bishop. This is a logical place to put your bishop in the French defences. White, because you're defending this pond with we know later on can become weakness depending on what happens. And then you're also put yourself in addition to tuck it back. If you get attacked by the black knight is gonna put it onto G three. So, for example, they get a piece out there. We could have archbishop out. They get the RUC out. Also, the idea of being that they're going to defend the center and they're going to make it so the pieces are all coordinated. Notice white hasn't done anything that forced them into those other lines that we saw were good for black there, simply developing their pieces but not allowing us to create any weaknesses. And while we could immediately trade this bishop office night and create its weakest, we're choosing here just to keep the tension in this case. There's a pin now because the RUC went there. But I want to show you what happens if there's no trade yet at both side that is playing the long game and looking for some sort of strategic adventure. We're not in a hurry to trade out this bishop of this night on Lee. If they force us to. We also want to develop our pieces. Okay, so, as we saw were at some point with the brookover, etc. One. You do that sooner rather than later and aiming down the board like any other positions. He may want to do the same thing and defend this pawn so that later on, if this gets opened up, it's not a problem like it was those other positions. And now we're just playing strategic chest were gonna improve our pieces written with our night here. It was not doing which they're the whole point of us. Developing in the 1st 57 as we saw before, is to finally end up with the 96 were attacking this bishop now. So he's just gonna tuck it back, which was the idea of the move in the first place and noticed both sides have a really good game. There's a strategic fight for the center, and bull sides are developing their pieces. There's no real advantages in space or activity. But just remember that as black is good, White has an initiative at the beginning. And basically, by neutralizing their initiative and giving ourselves an equal position and again one that is slightly easier toe play, we have done our job as black. So again, if we want to, we can go ahead and play that six year those we haven't lived the queen yet. We're not in any rush to do it. We couldn't with the queen to be six at any point. We now why it would have this knight to a four. So we didn't want to get a clean up before blink of 61 thing we could Dio is we could just go ahead and trade the night. Now, Orson, to go there and then we can put our queen on either be six or maybe even go all the way over to a four, threatened this pawn and threaten this point all of a sudden. Now, actually, he has a problem. So that's just another thing that you could speak. It happened. The situation, Um that works well for black. Okay? He's going to want to avoid that, obviously. So this is something that when you're calculating and you haven't made any trading aboard, you want to look and see how each move affects your position. So, for example, why we want to see here if they go to see one? Okay. What happens now? If Black trades out this night, they would want to see this queen to a five trade trade queen A 50 no, this is a problem. All right. What? We need to calculate this out and see this move. This is a good example, but I need to be looking ahead two or three moves. There's nothing that why can do now to defend both of these haws. Okay, He has to pick one, and now he's kind of in a bind. So that means of this route? To see one move was a mistake. Okay, so what he would want to do instead would be like something that move this night first, or maybe even go ahead and make this trade now, because this point is very well defended. It takes away trade of this night, and then you can play rope to see one. Okay, so this is what's going to govern a lot of our decisions copulating and seeing of the tactics that are going to happen and then avoiding those tactics. They say that chess is 1% strategy, 99% tactics. It's obviously an exaggeration. But no matter what we're doing in the position of having strategic knowledge we have in the opening, we still need to continuously calculate ahead to make sure that we don't walk into something bad and just lose upon willy nilly, which could actually be on the debt. No, in the position you're playing, it's stronger opposition. Being down one or two ponds is usually known for lose. The game is that they can trade off the position the pieces successfully and go into an endgame. Usually you will be able to get upon across on, promotes to queen and win the game, so the lower level chest. We may not think that losing upon is a big deal As you get stronger, you do not want to be losing ponds in the middle game. You'll end up losing most of those games unless, as we saw earlier, you can turn the on into a gambit where he tradeoff upon in order to mess up their position and activate your pieces. That's why we call certain positions gambit to give them material. King's Gambit. The Queen's Gambit Evans Gambit Centra In order to activate your piece and get some compensation, as we say for the sacrifice but most of time, you can't just be dropping ponds. Okay, so that's one thing that White could do here is to trade off that point. Or simply they can move this night. Or, for example, they play a three now noticed this pawn is defended. Now go ahead and trade and then decide to put our queen on a five. White can simply defend that opponent. Now trade. They can trade, and this wouldn't benefit black. We have a big trade here, and then a position is equal. In fact, lights slightly better because they have a bishop pair and we have a weak bishops. This would be really, really good for White. We wouldn't want to let this happen. Okay? That just shows you how the game slight variations and moves how it can change everything. So it doesn't mean that this is bad for black. It just means that we wouldn't choose to play Queen a five and try to attack that pond or anything that they decided to play. A three here will still trade off the bishop here and not lose a tempo will allow them to stack their ponds here. And whether or not we played Queen a five simple things were not going to trade this part. Right now, his plan is actually not defended. So we're gonna probably something simple, like they six, if this happened, just shows you another way that we could play in a position he might cited his lookout aimed on the board pushes pawn down. And then we can once again look to play, have six. Probably first we want Attackers Bishop with that knight and then activate our pieces. We can play offsets. Okay, Now, again, you see something somewhere before. If we take on f six. We have a strong center. Once again, Black is getting the upper hand, so he's not going to want to take it. He's going to continue to look to improve his position. Maybe by doing something like playing is pulling down the logical thing to do. And we're just playing a good game of chess. But we've achieved everything we wanted to achieve from blacks. Point of view and taking away. What's initiative? What's he getting, having a weakness, that we can play against a generally easier game to play here. We're going to start calculating things like takes, tastes. Now they have a choice. Take both responses, gets really complicated all of a sudden, what happens in this situation, this multiple possible upon trades in the center? All of a sudden, we have to look at this and copulate all these different variations. What do we do in this case? We probably would gain by playing Defour and having this strong central pond chain going into the middle. Even though White can now easily defend this e five pawn, they have to tie the pieces down to it, as we've seen in all of the other variations and we have a nice position. This is something that you might see in the freshness. Remember, this is with best play from wise, with white making really good moves, and we still have an easier position to play. This is in the win over variation. White played a lot of grand master level moves, and still, even though they didn't make any great mistakes, just the nature of the position that ends up usually being better for black. 12. Lesson 11 The Exchange Variation: Now we're going to look at the exchange variation that I mentioned on the first lesson as well. Now this one is the one that I said it leads to symmetry and is basically a dead even position. This is good from blacks, point of view, because basically White has allowed us to take away the initiative of the match immediately . So you might think well, then why would Why play the exchange variation if it leads to no advantage at all for White and in fact, it gives black parent and allows blacks equalized position. And the reason is is that oftentimes it's just hard to play against the French defence. And as I said, I like to play this exchange variation myself in my games because it leads to unequal position and then I could use my hopefully better play to win the game. Whereas a lot of the different positions for whites, one of you, the French defence or rather uncomfortable and it's just so easy to make a mistake, it's psychologically. It's not that fun play, especially if you play a lot of blitz as I do. You have anything a lot of time to calculate and black and get a good adventure. I really love to play the fresh oppresses black. I would a lot of my caves playing it that way. And if I was white, I immediately just play the exchange variation that go into a standing position. I don't think very much. It's gonna be an open board, open time position where? There. Ah, lot of tactics and a lot of calculation, but it is equal for pulled side. So for black, if you see why it go ahead and play next generation, this is totally fine. What you're gonna see is a lot of symmetry. So basically, usually white will take this bishop out to here in orderto stop black from getting their bishop out first. So White Walking Times played Bishop to D three is a good move. We'll go ahead and just take our nights out and just try to castle as soon as possible. They'll do the same. We'll get our bishop out to a decent square castle castle. And then they might do something like play upon Teoh C three, which defends a central planning. And the problem with playing C four is if we traded the no economic isolated queen's pawn in isolated Queen Pond or I Q. P is a known type of position where basically, you give up your central pond structure in order to have a rapid activation of your pieces . So we're going Teoh, Look at that in the next lesson. Right now, I'm just going to show you guys what happens if it is play a standard sort of pollen structure in the exchange variation, that kind of position that you'll see. We may do something like go ahead and make this pin on the night and get on your piece out . Basically, in order to not have ah hover position, what's kind of be forced to put this bishop back here, holding it with the night to be, too? It really doesn't matter all that much. You're gonna have to calculate a lot so we can't go through every variation in the exchange variation because you have to calculate so much there so many different possibilities. The borders wide open since we exchange the pond in the center and it allows bull sides to get their pieces out rapidly. There are, like an infinity number of different variations of different move orders they're going to see in the exchange variation. This is another reason why it gives equality and tends to be a very sort of Dhiraj position . Is that there just touching to the chances from both sides and no one has an advantage office. Whoever makes the best moves ever calculates the best is going to win the game. But again, it's good for black point of view because you equalize immediately, and that is not usually what White wants. So you oftentimes see a lot of these sort of pins going on here with the night because the nature of the position that allows it for both sides and, um very draw sh you notice that something really similar. So I went in and kind of move for Black C five right here. Now, if White decides to say, OK, I'm just gonna take that, because now if Black thinks back, whether it's with the bishop or the night will say things with the bishop this time because this night is helping to block this pin and allow the queen to escape Next move, for example, take back with his bishop. So we have an isolated queen pawn. Now, this is a very, very common scenario you'll see in many different positions and chess. And what happens is white. In this case, it doesn't have the isolating respond. It's going to try to pressure this target and aim its pieces onto this target. Now, course Black hasn't won 1/2 a tile. This piece is down to defend this target. I mean, he will have to defend it if necessary. But what the reason we've accepted to have a nice day, Queen Point is because notice that by having this pond right here, both of the e file on the sea files are open and has lots of money that they agape open for our pieces to be very mobile. So blast pieces. Now we're gonna have more dynamism, more mobility and more energy. But in exchange, we have granted the opposition to have a target and a potential weakness in our position. So both sides get something, and that is gonna be the theme that dictates the play for the rest of the game. Okay, so in this case, I mean, this could happen on either side, depending on the moves are playing. You're gonna have to do a lot of calculating In the exchange variation, you're gonna always have some sort of an open position with a lot of active pieces. So if you're someone who likes to play an open position, a lot of active pieces and you know, like the exchange elevation of the French, do you like to play more closed position on a longer, more strategic style game that you're gonna want to try to avoid the exchange variation of the French? But thing is, if you play the French offense, I mean you can't avoid the exchange aeration. If White chooses to trade that Poland at the beginning of the game, you can't avoid it. This is why a lot of white players like myself choose the exchange because it dictates the game. Whereas when you're black, the reason that we're learning the French offenses did you almost always get to dictate the play. And even though you don't necessarily get an advantage if your opponent is a really good French player at White this way, at least White is dictating to play psychologically that have a big impact. It also helps playing blitz. You want to do any decision to make any decisions or go do any thinking of calculating. At the very beginning, I I see someone to play the French. I immediately go into the exchange variation. I set up a normal position and I actually would all usually dio as white is I will feel Keto bishops and either allow myself to have an isolated Greenspon or I will have to strong field head of the bishops and I won't tak their king aggressively. Eso That's what we look at next We're gonna look at what White will dio if he's a good player in the exchange variation one of the ways in which they will play and we look at what to do about it as black. But also if you choose to play, you know e four and your opponent plays the French defence. Now you know you know the best ways to play against it, or at least what your options are. If you like to play open aggressive positions and the your your opponent chooses the French , the play the exchange variation being cut of your bishop and attack their king. And I'm gonna show you guys how to do that next 13. Lesson 12 The Exchange Variation King attack: could not make sure you guys an actual game that I played a white against French defense. I played the exchange creation. This was on the Internet of several months ago and has pulled its ups. I remember getting really, really strong, strong position in a big attack against their king. This player was rated, I think, about 17 100. Pretty strong, good player. And they just made a few inaccurate moves. You could tell they were super familiar with the exchange oration that weren't very comfortable in it, and I got a really, really dominant position. So let's show you how this can happen. So we go to the French. So when they do that, I definitely take it because I was by the exchange variation. I just don't even hesitate. Don't want to waste the time on the clock. I know what I'm trying to accomplish. So I go ahead and I play a membership to Deep three being played. They play. They played this same lose me this symmetry, doing the exact same thing, so I know looks equal. But even though it's basically equal why it still has a tiny, tiny, tiny edge just because you got to move first. You still got a slight condition. It's basically equal. But if you play with energy you played actively. Then you can realize an advantage later in the game. So basically the exchange radiation for what it calls for very, very active Blake and getting your pieces mobilized as fast as possible took my night out. They made that pin. I just blocked it with the night. So they trade. Always take back the night problem that took their night out. I castle the castle and then I immediately get ready to feel cattle. My darks Word picture. This is what I do. I can in the exchange variation because by setting up both your bishops and these squares, you're aiming them at the black King. And then if you can get your queen into an aggressive position to support these bitches as well a very, very dangerous. And it can lead Teoh checkmate or Boston to over black If they're not careful Berries usually. So in this game, Black has made some normal moves that they were not the best news, obviously, but they were just, you know, developing their pieces. They were playing a little bit like basically, you'll see this. A lot of people they just make, like, sort of normal lives came to get my night out. It's a logical thing to do. In this case. They weren't calculating very carefully. They weren't seeing how dangerous the situation could become. So I called up logically. Bishop on B two, they move the roof over. That's kind of a waste. That move. I think I would move my other look over. That would have been better if they move this book over into the center and, um, organize their pieces better than got the queen up so I wouldn't have moved this broke out of his book, Probably last. But they decided they wanted to put the RUC here. Probably a good idea being they're gonna move this night at some point, have been pushed upon, which is the logical thing to do. I don't think they recognized the danger of the formation of some of my pieces. And so I mean, played a C four in order to gain space for my pieces. Potentially pushes pawn forward more. I could I could charge forward depending on what black did, and game space and attack on the the Queen Side while also attacking on the King's that this would be using the principle to weaknesses and give myself optionality in the game, depending on what it is, the black that Black decided here to go ahead and take, which is kind of a questionable thing to do. If I would have taken his poem on the next move, he could take back with his night and put his night and active central location, and I would have the isolated queen ponts of him. Choosing to take here was not a very good move. And while I could have taken back with this pawn and give myself a nice central pond structure since its two bonds that are isolated, it's not the center of the board of the side. They're actually easier to attack that you think, and I chose to go for the more dynamic option, which was a take back with my bishop and have pulled my bishop, a bishop aimed at their king. And they haven't isolated Queen's Bond. Like I discussed with you guys in the last lesson. They're going to try to attack that pawn, and I'm going to try to not give them enough time by play with aggression. So right immediately he wanted to put my bishop and try to trade it off. I said no, I keep my fish is obviously And so I ended at this vulnerable uh, H seven square. Okay, Human whose rook over. I would like to lean over creating this battery here. So now if this night moves, I could take this upon a smart thing. To do in this situation is simply to take this move right here to move his pawn down to H six. And that way, no matter what happens, you could move his night. And then even though I have a check, it achieved nothing. This poem would no longer be intentions. That's a smart little tactics. No. Whenever someone sets up their pieces this way, my opponent chose not to do that. And then he's decided to take this night. So I guess who's following the principle that generally, once you are under pressure, usually benefits you to trade pieces and you relieve the pressure. Now, this night was not a very active piece. And in fact, lightsquared Bishop, this is one of his most active pieces. So this trade for him, it doesn't make any sense. This is another week move noticed. He doesn't make any outright blunders using making huge mistakes. But he's not making very good moves, either, and it's just shows you in chess. They have to be really efficient, every single one of your moves. It matters a great deal. Noticed this move that he made with his night thinking. OK, I'm going to attack his bishop. He allowed me to put my bishop on a really good square where I wanted it to go. And now his night is on the rib. We know that on the rib is grim or of staying out of the river dim. It's a bad place for the night to be. So is peace or not very efficient and not a very good squares, even though it doesn't look right now, like my position is wholly dominating, it's really dangerous. All my pieces are set up. I'm not worried at all about him trading his night off. That's why, but decide on D two in the first place. So he traded it off. No problem. He decided to move his night back to the scent of the board and also attacked this home, which is generally the right idea. You might want to you of attack. It's part of the night and maybe move this bishop back to both, defend this square attack on a second time and generally start putting pressure on this poem. That's what he wants to do. However, in this case, he loses to tactics. I can push his point afford. And even though his night can take it, I've uncovered this long. That agonal that the special is aimed towards this king was exactly why I put him. It's feeling kind of position and again, once his night moves take it, I can take this plant now we're playing a blitz game. I think this is a 10 minute game, if I recall correctly, so it's easy for your points to make mistakes. But this is one of the lessons from learning the open that if you play blitz, it's really easy for your opponents. Just either spend too much time thinking, and therefore you get an advantage on the clock or they don't know the position that well, they don't have time to calculate, and they make a mistake and you start to win. Very rapid. So this is how this game ended up. He took this pond. I have course, took this much more important pawn with a check, and it was King over. He probably should have moved. Is King over to F eight in this case. So it's just yet another small error that he made here. It seems like I'm gonna McKeen in the corner of the danger of this, though, is that if I'm able to get a river queen over this h file, I have a very, very dangerous discovered check. And now there's so checkmate threats that are already starting to happen Notice. Oftentimes in this situation, if you have ah, bishop here, what black do is push this pollen forward and try to trap that bishop in but doesn't work because my bishop has this pawn. And so it is very, very dangerous here. And so what I did was I attacked this night, which is hanging, and I activated this rook piece. It's also people notice across from the Queen. So I did three things that activated a piece I attacked on opponents piece and I initiated threats. Now I have multiple threats coming and black just not defending. Very well. He decided. Teoh, move this Bishop back, which uncovers this defense. The Queen is not offending this night, but the queen is also pinned. I mean, this night is also pinned now, so it's very, very dangerous. And even though this bishop is defending this pond piece, it allows me to make a really strong move. His pieces were just not in very good position. So I could move my queen here to F five. And now this night is pinned and he's gonna be forced to defend it. Otherwise he's gonna lose a piece. This bishop is still defended by my queen. And this pawn is paying the cattle down. And if he does, go ahead and defend this pond this night by going here. So pretty much Onley. Move now! I can not take it yet, but he's totally immobilized. All of his pieces are stuck and there's nothing he can do. I've got a lot of really dangerous things that I could do Now he is threatening my queen. And so this is where some calculation comes into play. I can take this on here And even though it allows him, you take this Bishop, there is King. I basically sacrifice the peace, but I've got enormous enormous threats. I can move his rook up here to D four, threatening to play Brooke too. H four. Checkmate. I came with his night down immediately and give him a check and force him back into the corner. And I elected to play stage four and he is stuck with a lot of bad options. Okay? One thing he could do to save the checkmate is to play Knight to G six, which guards this H four square. It doesn't allow me to make the checkmate. So notice you can go here and guard that square. I can simply take this night we're taking with my queen. He takes back with traded. I still have some threats, but notice I had sacrificed apiece. So material here is about a crime only up upon. So I don't want to trade off my queen in this situation. I don't want to give him get him out. I don't want to let him out basically, So I can take this night by ruk and threaten his queen. He has to move his queen. I'm still threatening. Checkmate here. And so he's gonna try desperately, basically to trade off the queen's to see if he does something like this. He moves queen here, try to trade off. This is checkmate. And there's really nothing that he can do. There's nowhere that you can go. Okay? You can't. Was queen down here to h four nights, got it covered. And my rook eminent. Had the square covered. There is no where he can go to stop the check. Okay, so he resigned. My opponent resigned right here. And just notice how rapidly this attack took place. You would want to have noticed early on. This is really dangerous. You have both of his bishops aimed at my king, and I need to think about getting my pieces mobilized for defense. But you didn't really see the threat and you just went ahead and played passively. He didn't see that I could push this pawn for right here and cause a lot of problems for him, and he took it. So even after allowing this move of when he might have done instead is to put his night maybe on e seven, But Still, his pieces are very, very passive, and they're very tied up. One thing I could do here is simply take this night. Now force him to take back with Spahn. And so now this is already very dangerous. I went upon, put him in a bad position, and now I can look to bring my queen over and when this other way. So, basically, if you're gonna play against the French one good option, especially you like tactics like open position is a play. This exchange variation. And then feeling Keto, your bishop, you're gonna get a lot of good attacks on the king, and I get a lot of threats. It'll save you time. You can avoid all those really good variations for black, but I've been teaching you throughout the course. 14. Lesson 13 French Defense Conclusion: so I haven't seen. The French offense is one of the most useful openings against white blankie for as really useful, even more being a lot. People don't really know what to do against that. They're more used to seeing a lot of, Ah, the five responses or a lot of, uh C five responses, which is a Sicilian defense and a very, very popular one now. And it is aren't very well versed in the French defence, despite the fact that one of the oldest openings and it's one of the most useful hoping. So it's a really great addition to your repertoire. Definitely start practicing and playing it. And as we saw in this last game, if your opponent is no to do very well, it's really easy to get a dominant position lining up your bishops in this nice feeling. Keto situation and attacking the King Very, very dangerous and very, very threatening position. Really fun to play and as we saw here, just lots of different ways to win lots of really fun tactics and there's just nothing that Black could do. They were going to lose the matter what once they made a few passive moves. So if you're gonna play against White and they play the exchange creation just trying, Teoh, set up your pieces aggressively and be active. Just like that, you're gonna have a really active type of game, lots of tactics and just do your best to calculate and play your best. If you're gonna play in the other variations, study each of these videos very carefully. And after you watch a video, go and practice, play the French against your motives and then come back. Watch the videos again and go practice. You can watch the whole entire force and then start practicing with the best thing to Dio. Did you finish the video and practice that one variation multiple times get really used to it and then go ahead and watch another video and new variation and they go practice that one that's way really fresh in your mind. We play it and then it will stick in there for the future so that no matter what your opponent does, you have each of those variations learned by heart, and you understand the point of what you're trying to achieve with each of them. So what, you guys the best of luck in your games by the French defence. Thank you for taking the course and a good luck out there.