Chess School Quiz Challenge #23
Challenge
Black's move ...c6-c5 was a positional mistake. Hikaru Nakamura now managed to achieve a strategically almost won position with two precise moves. How did he do that?
Solution
Thanks to the half-open f-file and the powerful centralized knight on e4, White is better. But at first glance it seems that Black is still fully in the game. On the half-open d-file he could develop pressure against the d3-pawn, and in the long term he could benefit from his better pawn structure. White’s isolated doubled pawn on the g-file could become the target of Black's play.
The Norwegian grandmaster Aryan Tari with the black pieces in this game, played in Norway in 2023, must have speculated on such prospects. But he had overlooked or underestimated a concrete solution for White that transforms the position into an overwhelming, almost winning one for White within two moves. Black's last move ...c6-c5 will immediately turn out to be a strategic mistake.
Hikaru Nakamura went 1.Ba2xb3!, a move that is not immediately obvious. In general, we avoid exchanging bishops for knights, as in most constellations the long-moving bishops are slightly stronger than the knights with their limited radius. But here the move is the best, part of a plan to create a configuration in which the knight is stronger than the bishop.
After 1…axb3 2.c3-c4! …
... Nakamura's concept becomes tangible. This is almost a classic case of “bad bishop against good knight”, made for the textbook (or the Millennium chess school).
While the white knight on a central position has an indomitable effect in the black camp and is already putting pressure on the pawn on c5, the black bishop is trapped. The pawns on c5 (which is why ...c6-c5 was a mistake!) and e5 deprive him of any freedom of movement. Black has no breaks, no way to free his bishop. White will maintain the only pawn tension b5-c4 to keep the c5-pawn blocked.
Hikaru Nakamura had found a way to create a position in which his knight is clearly superior to his opponent's bishop.
In principle, there are two configurations in which knights are stronger than bishops.
- If, as here, the position is blocked and the bishop lacks space to maneuver or
- if the knight is planted on a central outpost in the opponent's half of the board (and cannot be driven away).
Also as an outpost, the knight is often the dominant light piece on the board. We have already seen such strong outpost knights here.
Let's end our excursion into the evergreen chess strategy topic of knight vs. bishop with a bon mot from the Czech-German grandmaster Vlastimil Hort, who died in 2025.
Hort pointed out a third configuration:
The former world championship candidate’s hint has nothing to do with pawn structures, bad bishops or other strategic considerations, but with the fact that the knight is the most tactically tricky piece on the board. In blitz chess, with only a few minutes on the clock, the knight's jumps are much more difficult to predict than the straightforward moves of other pieces on their lines or diagonals. There is probably no chess player who has never fallen for a knight fork in blitz.
