How Ulf Beats Black
In his prime in the 1970s and 80s, the Swedish grandmaster Ulf Andersson was a world top-ten player with an instantly recognisable style: he almost never lost, and he kept grinding out wins from positions that looked utterly quiet. This book reveals the secret — those positions only looked quiet.
Cyrus Lakdawala, who has played Andersson’s lines for decades, presents them as a complete White repertoire and explains the deep strategic understanding behind them. Andersson detected and exploited hidden chances better than almost anyone, and his openings glide smoothly from opening to middlegame and often straight into a favourable endgame — so this is far more than an opening manual; it is a course in positional squeezing.
The repertoire is built on the flexible 1.Nf3/1.c4/2.c4 move orders and covers everything Black can try: the King’s Indian, the Queen’s Indian and Hedgehog, the Catalan and Tarrasch structures, the Symmetrical English, the Modern and Pirc, the Dutch, and the Exchange Slav. The recommendations rest on understanding rather than memorised theory, so opponents can’t catch you with a novelty.
Lakdawala’s lucid, entertaining explanations make it ideal for club players who want to win the way Andersson did — quietly, positionally, and relentlessly.
Strategic Chess Exercises
Almost every chess puzzle book trains tactics — find the forced win. But in most of the positions you actually face in a game, there is no combination to find. What you are really doing, move after move, is trying to improve your position or worsen your opponent’s by applying strategic judgement. This book trains that neglected skill directly.
Experienced trainer Emmanuel Bricard has assembled a manual of carefully selected and tested positions where the task is not to calculate a tactic but to find the right plan: which piece to improve, which structure to aim for, where to create a weakness, when to exchange. Each exercise asks you to think the way you must in a real game when no forcing solution exists.
The positions are split into middlegame and endgame exercises and indexed by strategic theme, with detailed solutions that explain the reasoning rather than just giving the move. The benefits are practical: better strategic understanding, the ability to apply principles in concrete positions, and even time saved on the clock when you know what you are trying to do.
A rare and valuable training resource for club players and above who want to sharpen the part of their game that decides most non-tactical positions.
Club players all over the world who wish to improve their game have now access to Shereshevsky’s famous training program in one volume and can learn how to build an opening repertoire, how to work with the chess classics to maximum benefit, how to master the most important endgame principles and how to effectively and efficiently calculate variations.
It has been difficult for White to obtain any advantage in Sicilian sidelines, and this book therefore presents a complete repertoire for White in the most widely played main lines: the Open Sicilians with 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3. All of Black’s possible answers are covered.‘Dismantling the Sicilian’ is clearly organized, and each variation is presented with its history, its main ideas, its typical tactics and strategies, and with instructive games.
The Tarrasch Defence is one of the most ambitious ways to play against 1.d4. Black immediately fights for the centre, gets a lot of space and develops his pieces without many problems. Former Russian Champion Alexey Bezgodov has more than 30 years of experience with the Tarrasch and is one of the world’s greatest experts. The Art of the Tarrasch Defence is a deeply researched journey into the positional structures, the key moments in the fight for the initiative, the players and the variations.
Moskalenko’s lively style will infect you and encourage you to start playing this opening, which is a great weapon at any level, from club player to grandmaster. This new edition is completely reworked and fully updated from the original 2007 publication; It has been extended by 25% and contains new analysis, new games, new ideas and lots of novelties.
Renowned German chess trainers Erik Zude and Jörg Hickl have created an ideal club player’s repertoire for Black. This compact manual presents a set of lines that is conveniently limited in scope, yet varied, solid and complete. The core repertoire is based on lines that the authors have successfully played at (grand)master level for decades: the Antoshin variation of the Philidor Defence against 1.e4 and the Old-Indian Defence against 1.d4. There is only a limited number of plans, ideas and structures that you need to learn, and very few forcing variations.
My First Repertoire for Black
The companion to Vincent Moret’s popular White repertoire, this book does the same job for the other side of the board: a complete, ready-to-play set of Black openings for the player who wants something sound and understandable rather than a thicket of theory to memorise.
Against 1.e4 the recommendation is the Scandinavian — specifically the lively Portuguese Variation, with its early ...Bg4 and gambit ideas — chosen because it leads to clear, comfortable development and the same kinds of positions game after game. Against 1.d4 Moret gives the Stonewall, a solid "unbreachable fortress" set-up, and the book rounds out the repertoire with sensible answers to the English, the Réti, and the various irregular first moves.
The guiding principles are the same throughout the series: lines that don’t date quickly, don’t demand heavy memorisation, and are easy for an improving player to absorb. Every chapter is reinforced with exercises so you learn the typical plans and tactics, not just the move order.
Ideal for juniors and adult improvers assembling their first real Black repertoire — and a natural pairing with My First Repertoire for White.
The Complete Manual of Positional Chess, volume 2
This is the second half of the training course Konstantin Sakaev and Konstantin Landa built for the DYSS, Russia’s elite sports school for young chess talents. Where Volume 1 laid the foundations, Volume 2 goes wide and deep — a genuinely comprehensive reference covering the two engines of practical play: pawns and dynamics.
The first part takes Nimzowitsch’s dictum that "pawns are the soul of chess" literally, working through every important structure in turn: passed and protected passed pawns, blockades, pawn chains and how to break them, backward, doubled, isolated, connected and hanging pawns, the minority attack, pawn breaks, and the destruction of the enemy centre.
The second part turns to dynamics and tactics — open and discovered attacks, the standard combinational motifs (pin, fork, double attack, deflection, overload, interference), the classic sacrifices on h7 and f7, attacks on the castled and uncastled king, opposite-side castling races, and the art of eliminating defenders and bringing every piece into the attack.
Each topic is explained as a transferable tool rather than a list of examples, in the structured DYSS style. This is an advanced reference for players aiming at master strength who want one coherent treatment of the whole middlegame. Best used alongside Volume 1.
The Sveshnikovs clearly explain the ideas and plans for both sides and provide exercises and test positions. After reading and studying this book, White players, from amateurs to Grandmasters, will make their opponents’ lives even more difficult.
International Master Luis Bernal has unraveled the Berlin and made it accessible for amateur players. His practical guide is fully up to date, explains typical formations and strategies, and presents new ideas and resources in the old Berlin Wall structures.
Cookie settings
We use cookies to deliver and improve our services, analyze site usage, and if you agree, to customize or personalize your experience and market our services to you. You can read our Cookie Policy hier.
