Chess Defenses

The game of chess is more than just a battle of wits, and the whole idea is to get an effective combination of defenses and attacks. Simply threatening other pieces with unflinching bravado is not a strategy that can work all the time, so this makes the need for chess defense strategies even more profound. The best players of chess are those people who can find the right balance and cohesion between their attacks and defense, and decide when is the best time for each.

Chess defenses are important because they result in saving your pieces. But if you are getting pressurized and pegged back a lot, remember that the best form of defense is attack. Sometimes it is better to sacrifice some small pieces, like pawns, in order to gain an advantage or for the purpose of simply escaping an opponent's attacking moves. The best defense moves are those which are not just unexpected, but dangerous as well. The idea is to devise a move that distracts the opponent from his current course of action and forces him to focus his attention elsewhere.

The Sicilian Defense
The Sicilian defense chess move is a chess opening move that is commonly used by many people. From the very beginning of a game, one can start pressurizing their opponents, and if this move is followed up well, it can lead to a fairly quick victory. To explain the move, you must first understand the nomenclature for the various squares on the chess board. The 8 columns are named as a, b, c, d, e, f, g, and h; while the 8 rows are numbered from bottom to top as 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. thus when we say a1, we mean the bottom left square on the board.

As mentioned earlier, a lot of defense moves arise from the Sicilian defense. Assuming that the player in white has moved the first pawn to e4, the black side should move its pawn to c5. This gives one an opportunity to attack the d4 square, which is almost on the center of the board. This position can be leveraged to gain an advantage in many different ways. One of the alternatives for the white player now is to move another pawn to d4 and offer it in sacrifice, and then offer another pawn in sacrifice at c3. If the black player accepts this gambit, the white player can attack the pawn with his knight and gain an advantage in the center. This is also known as the Smith-Morra Gambit. Some other moves that arise from the Sicilian defense are the Alapin Variation, the closed Sicilian, the Grand Prix Attack, Sveshnikov Variation, Dragon Variation, Accelerated Dragon, and the Najdorf Variation.

Chess French Defense
This is another very popular sequence, but not quite as effective as the Sicilian defense. The success rate of defensive measures for the black player is the highest with the Sicilian defense, but the French defense is a close second. The French defense is characterized by the first move of e4 e6, that is, the black player moves his first pawn to e6 in response. This game becomes a bit more restrictive and less expansive, as the black player finds it quite difficult to move around in the initial stages. As a result, this leads to a lower degree of risk on his behalf. Another advantage of this defense is that the black player gets a lot of openings to launch counter attacks. It can catch an unaware white player by surprise many times during the course of a game.

In the next move white usually moves to d4, and black moves to d5. What happens next is entirely in the hands of the white player. He can either move his pawn from e4 to e5, or he can capture the pawn at d5, or he can cover his e4 pawn by moving his queen side knight out. Chess defenses are not meant to be adhered to rigidly, as each situation can demand a different approach. The player must analyze the risks involved and see what he stands to gain, before making each move. Another famous chess defense known as the Baltic defense chess is characterized by the following moves: 1. d4 d5 2. c4 Bf5. What happens after this is again in the hands of the players entirely.

These moves epitomize the very essence of the game, that is, the idea of turning defense into attack. To defend just for the sake of it is quite pointless and without ambition, instead one should take the initiative and try and launch quick and expansive counter attacks. Learn to assess each situation individually, and pretty soon you will begin to see which defenses are the most suitable each time.