Very good video, as usual. Could you say something about what kind of thoughts you'd have about figuring out why the opponent's move must be bad? Or is it pure calculation? I'm thinking along the lines of running through rules or something to say, "Okay, his move is bad because he gives up the control of the e4 square."

Of course, tactics should take precedence, I think, but positional concerns like the above can lead to a way to come up with where the tactics will lie later on. Does that make sense? Stop me if you disagree... Thanks Dennis. Keep up the good philosophy and chess.

Nice informative video. This kind of thing happens to me all the time, but I usually find out their move just drops a pawn 3 or 4 moves later. I think I successfully calculated almost 70% of what you showed, but a big accomplishment for me. I checked out your blog and was very impressed. There are so many interesting chess news, puzzles, and links. It even let me find the results of my teammates who went to SuperNationals (1st place for U1600). Thanks for the challenging exercises and the overall discussion on irregular moves in the opening.

Good video and a very pretty game. Only suggestion I would have was that although you showed where the deviation from the main line occurred, you didn't really explicitly state how that would change blacks plan. Yes, there were lots of variations, but I didn't quite grasp where the theme changed from the plans of the main line. For instance, playing c4 straight away eliminated the potential pin on the black knight which seemed to be important to white's plan in the 'book' version. I guess this post is kinda murky and incoherent, but I think it would help if you mixed in generalities prior to going into variations.

WolfgangSenff: I suppose the "Why is my opponent's move bad?" question will be answered depending on the characteristics of the position. (Sorry, but "It depends" is a pretty common answer in a world with lots of variety!) In the case we examined in this video, the position is so sharp, and White is giving up material, so it's natural to focus on the tactics. In other positions, a move might be bad because it creates some chronic weaknesses. You might not always have enough knowledge or tactical ability to work everything out (that's true for all of us), but having a suitably suspicious mindset gives you a better chance to work it out.

zmanuel1: I'm glad you enjoyed the video and the blog. The blog's address, for those who aren't familiar with it (tsk, tsk!) is http://chessmind.powerblogs.com.

JWhis: I'm not sure what pin on the knight you mean. Do you mean the potential pin on the d-pawn with 10.Rd1? As for the generalities, I think I said a little about them - White is trying to kick at the pd5/Ne4 construction as quickly as possible - but perhaps I could have said more. I think I did offer some guidance about the ideas in the normal line with 10.Rd1 0-0 11.c4 etc., but perhaps I could have said more in a general way about the 10.c4 idea. Since it devolves almost completely into tactics right away, though, I'm not certain how necessary or useful it would have been in this case, but I'll try to think about it in case of a similar case in the future.

good video can u take a video on najdorf?

How come the video stopped at around 10 minutes? I was really enjoying the video and felt it could help my play.

Also Dennis, could you help me find your videos on Chessbase? Do I have to watch it live or can I replay it at anytime?

Thanks.

Aravind8000: I've done a couple of videos presenting games I played against the Najdorf. I don't have any plans to present any more Najdorf games in the immediate future, but it could very well happen in the future.

Alexrules01: I don't think the problem is with the video but with the site - they've been having problems which they're in the process of fixing.

Regarding my ChessBase videos, I explain how to tune in each week on my blog. (The address is given in my signature, below.) Briefly, they're on the ChessBase news site but on their server (the "Playchess" or "Fritz" server, as it's sometimes called). To watch them live, for free, log on to playchess at 9 p.m. ET on Wednesday nights, go to the Broadcast room, select the games tab and then either find the game I'm covering (I advertise it on my blog and on the ChessBase news page earlier that day) or double-click on my handle ("Initiative") under the player list. The shows are also archived there, and cost about 50 cents to watch.

Thank you, I will check out the blog

At the first test position, I chose Nc5 instead of bxc4. Since you did not discuss it, I thought I must be wrong, but then I sicked my computer on it, and it finds it as good as bxc4. Why not consider it?