Use your king

Your king is often the centre of attack in the opening and middle game phases of a chess game. You must hide it behind pawns and other pieces for it's own protection.

However, the king is a fighting piece in its own right. Only when most of the major pieces have gone can it enter the endgame because the board is a much safer place. The king should enter the endgame because every fighting resource is usually required to push a pawn to promotion.

The only lone pieces a king can never move next to are a king and queen. I just thought of that.

Castleing (King Side 0-0 or Queen Side 0-0-0) is by far the most common defensive move executed by players, but just as strong (with an opponents Bishop removed from the board) is for the King to occupy a square with a pawn just in front that is in turn protected by a Bishop.

Not advocating this as a premium defense, just advising it is a very tough nut to crack, but it does depend very much on what else (opponents pieces) are left on the board

The pawn with a Bishop behind it, is in itself a very strong position, by puting the King immediately behind the pawn and right next to the potecting Bishop and you have a very strong position with an escape route !

Try it !

white-pawn

There's a great game by Nigel Short v Jan Timman where Short uses his King aggressively in the middle game. It's well worth looking up and it taught me a lot about the need to look beyond the stereotypical.

Best wishes,
Steve

[Event "Tilburg 53/115"]
[Site "Tilburg 53/115"]
[Date "1991.??.??"]
[EventDate "?"]
[Round "?"]
[Result "1-0"]
[White "Nigel Short"]
[Black "Jan Timman"]
[ECO "B04"]
[WhiteElo "?"]
[BlackElo "?"]
[PlyCount "67"]

1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.d4 d6 4.Nf3 g6 5.Bc4 Nb6 6.Bb3 Bg7 7.Qe2
Nc6 8.O-O O-O 9.h3 a5 10.a4 dxe5 11.dxe5 Nd4 12.Nxd4 Qxd4
13.Re1 e6 14.Nd2 Nd5 15.Nf3 Qc5 16.Qe4 Qb4 17.Bc4 Nb6 18.b3
Nxc4 19.bxc4 Re8 20.Rd1 Qc5 21.Qh4 b6 22.Be3 Qc6 23.Bh6 Bh8
24.Rd8 Bb7 25.Rad1 Bg7 26.R8d7 Rf8 27.Bxg7 Kxg7 28.R1d4 Rae8
29.Qf6+ Kg8 30.h4 h5 31.Kh2 Rc8 32.Kg3 Rce8 33.Kf4 Bc8 34.Kg5
1-0

Andy,

Thanks for finding that.

Best wishes,
Steve

Just read your thing on castling. will try and do that more often.
Jim