The pawn offer on e4. Opening lines on the e-file by moving the same pawn for the second time in an opening where you have no pieces out and you've exchanged your DSB for a knight?

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White has more space, but is a pawn down and with isolated and doubled pawns which will be weak in an endgame. Black, with careful development and giving the pawn back at the right time, should equalize without too much difficulty.

For example, after 7...exf3 8. Nxf3 Nf6 9. Bg5 Nbd7 10. Qd2 h6 11. Bxf6 Nxf6 12. Bd3 c5! (position below)

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13. O-O (13. dxc5 Qa5 14. c6 bxc6 15. O-O O-O ) 13... O-O 14. Rae1 b6 15. Qf4 Bb7 16. Ne5 Rc8 to (position below)

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Black's opening wasn't all bad: he lured White's Q forward to take those pawns, then earns the tempi back by pecking at her. After <12...O-O-O 13.Qb4> Black is actually ahead in development.

Alas, the pawn structure is a permanent edge for White's Q-side attack. Caro-Kann <1..c6> and O-O-O elevates White's threat-of-Bf4 into an 8-point gorilla (e.g. 13..Qc7 14.Bf4 Qb6 drops a tempo). Presumably, this structural flaw motivates Black to castle short in C-K? Which in turn suggests that White saw deeper, and <10..Nbd7 11.Qd6!> is a nimble positional-sac-with-sting: White "sacs" an implied tempo to prevent O-O and make O-O-O irresistible ... the sting being that Black "castles into it". Who's kicking whom around!

Funny: White does actually have Ba6 for a potential Boden, hence Qxc6+ was a remote threat (if White ever gets a tempo to reposition his Q). Indirectly, this ties Black's Q down to defend c6 and/or forces Qs off.

Of course, this does not mean that every loose piece drops off, in all circumstances and regardless of who is to move. That would be tedious in the extreme.

It is a general guiding principle, a witty piece of guidance, a bon mot, a little nugget of gleaming wisdom in the dross of pedantry and whining that soils the modern age.

Of course, he could have written something that was a little more idiot-proof, such as "Loose pieces often fall off, depending on whose move it is and whether the opponent has sufficient threats to be able to take advantage of the aforementioned looseness of said pieces."

That might have saved him from the pettiness of the small-minded, but it would have been a less memorable and well-written aphorism.

<Once>, writing in the style of Nunn, writes "Stalemated kings get mated", trusting that at least some of our more erudite readers would spot the source quotation.

18...h6 makes reasonable sense if he wanted to avoid 19 Bxf6 Nxf6, drawing the N away from queenside defence duties. Perhaps he had personal problems distracting him.

For example, if Black had instead played 18...a6, then 19. b5! cxb5 20. Bxb5 Rc8 21. c6! (position below)

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In his book "Secrets of Practical Chess" J.Nunn coined the phrase "Loose pieces Drop off" about the danger of loose pieces, they <tend> to drop off the board.

And this is correct.
But <stalemated kings> as usual <tend> to draw the game, but not <get mated>. Stalemate is considered a draw.

(With apologies to Agatha Christie.)

Well, maybe a quasi-maximummer (or, more accurately, a two-thirds maximummer). The third move (21. Rxa2#) is more nearly a minimummer.

If any of the above is not meant ironically, I can only say I'm sorry about your lobotomy.

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Take a look at the black king sitting on a8. You will see that the king has no moves. He is blocked in by his own pawns on a7 and b7, and by the white bishop on f4.

We might coin the phrase that the <king> is stalemated. Note that we are not saying that the <position> is a stalemate. For that to happen, all of black's pieces would have to have no legal moves. That would indeed be a draw, if the player with the stalemated <position> could not make a legal move.

Accuracy, hmmm?

Stalemated kings are useful because they tell the attacking side that a mating net is nearly formed - an unanswerable check would be mate.

Stalemated kings are also useful because they tell the defending side that they are in danger. In this POTD, this ought to have alerted the player of the black pieces to look to his king's safety and not to play 18...h6.

Many of our easier puzzles which end in mate start with a king that is either stalemated or nearly stalemated.

This is how language and thinking evolve. Someone comes up with a new idea or a new term, like LPDO or "stalemated king" or GOOT. Sometimes these terms catch on, sometimes they don't. That's how the lexicon of something like chess matures and becomes more sophisticated.

Since they share a hobby (albeit with different targets), perhaps he should look up <JoergWalter> and they can practice their marksmanship on one another.

This would not only keep them usefully occupied, but it might, in time, improve their aim sufficiently that they won't inadvertently mow down entire fora with their misdirected sprays of verbal shrapnel.

It would be nice to think that, but such hopes are not supported by my experience. People of this kind keep pushing until they fall.

Of course, in your case, the motivation is easy to see: The "critics" don't believe they can do what you do so well, so their thoughts are twisted by envy.

Since you have publicly requested the deletion of your account, should you not, in the name of consistency, hope they are?