Endgame: BBvBN -the minor exchange squeeze

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Endgame: BBvBN -the minor exchange squeeze
Compiled by Baby Hawk

Minor exchange - die kleine Qualität

"The minor exchange refers to the capture of the opponent's bishop for the player's knight (or, more recently, the stronger minor piece for the weaker) (Soltis 2004). Bobby Fischer used the term (Benko 2007), but it is rarely used.

In most chess positions, a bishop is worth slightly more than a knight because of its longer range of movement. As a chess game progresses, pawns tend to get traded, removing support points from the knight and opening up lines for the bishop. This generally leads to the bishop's advantage increasing over time.

Traditional chess theory espoused by masters such as Wilhelm Steinitz and Siegbert Tarrasch puts more value on the bishop than the knight. In contrast, the hypermodern school favored the knight over the bishop. Modern theory is that it depends on the position, but that there are more positions where the bishop is better than where the knight is better (Mayer 1997).

There are some occasions when a knight can be worth more than a bishop, so this exchange is not necessarily made at every opportunity to do so.

A rook and bishop usually work better together than a rook and knight in the endgame (Mayer 1997), (Beliavsky & Mikhalchishin 2000).

José Raúl Capablanca stated that a queen and knight work better together than a queen and bishop in the endgame (Mayer 1997).

More recently, John Watson has stated that from his study of this endgame that an unusually large proportion of queen and knight versus queen and bishop endings are drawn, and that most decisive games are characterized by the winning side having one or more obvious advantages (for example, having a knight against a bad bishop in a closed position, or having a bishop in a position with pawns on both sides of the board, particularly if the knight has no natural outpost).

Watson states that positions in this endgame in general "are very volatile, and often the winning side is simply the one who starts out being able to win material or launch an attack on the opposing king" (Watson 1998).

Glenn Flear agrees with that assessment for endgames. He could not find an endgame by Capablanca that supported his statement. The statistics for queen and bishop versus queen and knight endgames are about even. Most decisive games were won because of a significant advantage from the middlegame and only a limited number of positions show an inherent superiority for one over the other (Flear 2007)."

Source: Wikipedia article: The exchange (chess)#Minor exchange

Grandmaster Ronen Har-Zvi presented this game in a lecture: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aX4E... starts at around 29m00s

Position after <28.Nxc1>:

click for larger view

= = =

Horseman - how do you know this is just a short squeeze, and not the beginning of something much more substantial?

http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Chess_...

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...
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(B30) Sicilian, 55 moves, 1-0
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51.Nxe5! and the pawns are rolling...
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model game
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(D17) Queen's Gambit Declined Slav, 47 moves, 1/2-1/2
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Yanofsky vs Csom, 1975
(B62) Sicilian, Richter-Rauzer, 72 moves, 1-0
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(B63) Sicilian, Richter-Rauzer Attack, 60 moves, 1/2-1/2
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(C92) Ruy Lopez, Closed, 58 moves, 1-0
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(C07) French, Tarrasch, 46 moves, 0-1
A Matanovic vs Vasiukov, 1961
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BB+active King wins
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(B32) Sicilian, 73 moves, 1/2-1/2
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(D34) Queen's Gambit Declined, Tarrasch, 61 moves, 1/2-1/2
--> B-
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(D32) Queen's Gambit Declined, Tarrasch, 72 moves, 1/2-1/2
--> B= --> P --> Q -->P
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pp winning tactics
I Khmelnitsky vs Plachetka, 1997
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(E59) Nimzo-Indian, 4.e3, Main line, 41 moves, 1/2-1/2
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BBa:BN (2||)
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active BB (3:3||)
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(A52) Budapest Gambit, 64 moves, 1-0
BB4:BN5||
Eljanov vs V Durarbayli, 2014
(D85) Grunfeld, 47 moves, 1/2-1/2
G Caprio vs S Mariotti, 2014
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Musterbeispiel
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(B12) Caro-Kann Defense, 45 moves, 1-0
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(A53) Old Indian, 61 moves, 1/2-1/2
L Hyldkrog vs M Lecroq, 2004
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rapid
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(A05) Reti Opening, 107 moves, 1-0
H Kummer vs T Hofmann, 2012
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M Muzychuk vs A Stefanova, 2015
(B06) Robatsch, 74 moves, 1-0
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Seirawan vs de Firmian, 1987
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A Bivol vs E Mirzoeva, 2013
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M Matlakov vs B Bok, 2015
(A34) English, Symmetrical, 52 moves, 1-0
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--> B+
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BN+1
M Matlakov vs B Bok, 2016
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(A46) Queen's Pawn Game, 81 moves, 1/2-1/2
G Markzon vs I Nikolayev, 2011
(A52) Budapest Gambit, 41 moves, 1/2-1/2
Tal vs Antoshin, 1967
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Carlsen vs Predojevic, 2006
(C83) Ruy Lopez, Open, 88 moves, 1/2-1/2
BB2:BN1
Botvinnik vs Tal, 1961
(E80) King's Indian, Samisch Variation, 83 moves, 0-1
Bogoljubov vs Eliskases, 1939
(C83) Ruy Lopez, Open, 74 moves, 1/2-1/2
Anand vs Van Wely, 1997
(B08) Pirc, Classical, 41 moves, 1-0
P Prohaszka vs Swayams, 2016
(A08) King's Indian Attack, 103 moves, 1-0
Nakamura vs Pelletier, 2017
(A07) King's Indian Attack, 48 moves, 1-0
--> B:B-
M R Vukcevich vs D Drimer, 1960
(B36) Sicilian, Accelerated Fianchetto, 62 moves, 1-0
A Maltsevskaya vs S Volkov, 2017
(A08) King's Indian Attack, 40 moves, 0-1
M Kanep vs S Kindermann, 2008
(D11) Queen's Gambit Declined Slav, 79 moves, 0-1
Smirin vs HIARCS, 2002
(A30) English, Symmetrical, 60 moves, 1/2-1/2
Carlsen vs Van Wely, 2013
(E75) King's Indian, Averbakh, Main line, 33 moves, 1-0
B Grachev vs Karjakin, 2017
(E34) Nimzo-Indian, Classical, Noa Variation, 52 moves, 1-0
A Berube vs S Zhelesny, 2011
(D85) Grunfeld, 56 moves, 1/2-1/2
O M Hindle vs Tal, 1963
(B43) Sicilian, Kan, 5.Nc3, 52 moves, 0-1
Hort vs V Ciocaltea, 1973
(A56) Benoni Defense, 44 moves, 1-0
B Vainshtein vs V Goglidze, 1931
(E71) King's Indian, Makagonov System (5.h3), 65 moves, 0-1
S Drygalov vs S Pogorelskikh, 2018
(C55) Two Knights Defense, 62 moves, 1-0
Portisch vs Korchnoi, 1983
(D85) Grunfeld, 50 moves, 1/2-1/2
BB wins
Ljubojevic vs Smyslov, 1984
(C42) Petrov Defense, 42 moves, 1-0
||BB3:BN2||
Romanishin vs Huebner, 1985
(B23) Sicilian, Closed, 57 moves, 0-1
A Kveinys vs Tiviakov, 2002
(B32) Sicilian, 30 moves, 1/2-1/2
teknikal XceLanze
K Grigoryan vs J M Lopez Martinez, 2015
(A04) Reti Opening, 78 moves, 1-0
Gelfand vs Leko, 2009
(E15) Queen's Indian, 78 moves, 1-0
I Lysyj vs A Isajevsky, 2006
(D58) Queen's Gambit Declined, Tartakower (Makagonov-Bondarevsky) Syst, 78 moves, 1-0
BB:BN+1
T Gharamian vs H J Cordes, 2015
(C03) French, Tarrasch, 72 moves, 1/2-1/2
B Ider vs Romanishin, 2017
(A45) Queen's Pawn Game, 35 moves, 1-0
Reshevsky vs Browne, 1974
(A04) Reti Opening, 42 moves, 0-1
+5P
J Maiwald vs G P Arnaudov, 2019
(A07) King's Indian Attack, 45 moves, 1/2-1/2
Marshall vs Lasker, 1907
(D32) Queen's Gambit Declined, Tarrasch, 46 moves, 1/2-1/2
technical win
D Charochkina vs A Protopopova, 2019
(A01) Nimzovich-Larsen Attack, 69 moves, 1-0
BB w/a-pss
Tarrasch vs Rubinstein, 1912
(C48) Four Knights, 56 moves, 0-1
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