The Strange Power of Doing Nothing

Hi all, I thought I might find time to write a new post this week, but we didn’t quite get there! Planning to be back to the regular schedule next week. In the meantime, here’s one more from the archives.

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In my last tournament I noticed an odd pattern in several of my games. When I tried to attack, my plans backfired and my position got worse, but when I stopped trying to do anything, that was precisely the moment the game turned in my favor.

We often feel the urge to do something - create a threat or drastically change the position - but sometimes doing nothing at all puts the most pressure on the opponent by forcing them to come up with an idea all on their own.

In this game my pawn sacrifice as Black hadn’t panned out. Unable to come up with an active plan, I had little option but to wait.

24…h6 25. Ba3 Rc6

Now I had a chance to do something. The computer prefers 25…Rc3 threatening to wreck White’s kingside pawns with the exchange sacrifice Rxf3. I’m not sure why I didn’t do this, but sometimes creating a direct threat makes the opponent’s task easier by giving them something concrete to think about. In contrast, Rc6 invites White to do something. He could now win a pawn with 26. a5 Nd7 26. Qxb7, but that would release the pin along the 5th rank and allow 26…Nf4 with threats like Qg4 and Nxg2.

The computer still likes this for White, but it’s not that simple. The only move to keep the advantage is the far from obvious Bd6! My opponent must have seen something he didn’t like, because after a long think he also continued to wait.

26. h3 R8c7 27. Bc5?

Starting to go astray. This move attacks the knight on b6, but I was dying to move that piece anyway, since on b6 it’s dominated by White’s queenside pawns. Bc5 not only gives me a chance to move it, it gives me a free tempo since now Nd7 will hit the bishop. Notice how in this case doing something irrelevant - attacking the knight - backfires.

27…Nd7 28. Ne5?? 

And just like that White plays a losing blunder. While only one of Black’s many captures wins, it’s not too hard to find it simply by checking the options one-by-one.

28…Rxc5! 29. dxc5 Nxe5

With two dominant central knights against a rook, Black has a completely winning position. I decided the game with an attack on the king in a few more moves.

30. b4 Nd3 31. Rf1 N5f4 32. Rab1 Qe4 33. f3 Qe2

So to recap, in six moves I went from being a pawn down with no active plan to having a winning position, all by doing absolutely nothing. Of course, neither side played the best moves, but my opponent was rated 2100+ and this was a classical tournament game, so it wasn’t a cakewalk.

This happens more often than you’d think. I had another game in the same tournament that played out much the same way against an opponent rated almost 2400. I was gradually outplayed and at some moment I couldn’t think of anything to do so I just started shuffling pieces… and that was the moment things started to turn around.

Why does this happen? It’s a little like a tennis game. Many players don’t mind a hard shot blasted right at them because they can use the pace to their advantage by blocking and redirecting the shot. Lobs are often more unpleasant to deal with because they give you less to work with and more time to think about making a mistake. Similarly in chess, many players are comfortable reacting to direct threats because it gives them a concrete problem to solve, but left to their own devices they’ll wreck their own position in strange ways.

In general, winning a chess game requires you to do less than you might think. After one uninspiring victory, the British grandmaster Tony Miles said, “I did fuck-all, but it was enough.” Many players think chess is about brilliancies and deep ideas, but often simply putting your pieces on good squares and seizing a tactical opportunity is enough to get the W.

Likewise, many players have an unrealistic explanation of how much each move should do. They want to completely transform the position with every move. This might explain why many amateurs are too eager to exchange pieces. In the absence of better ideas, exchanging pieces is a way to drastically change the position.

I like to think of moves in two categories, building and breaking. Building moves improve the position without making a radical change - for example, moving a piece to a better square. Breaking moves fundamentally change the nature of the position - for example, captures and pawn breaks. Many amateurs play too many breaking and not enough building moves. Garry Kasparov once said that a grandmaster can play six strengthening moves in a row, but to be a super grandmaster you have to be able to play 12 in a row without losing patience.

The next time you’re in a position where you don’t know what to do, try dialing down your ambitions a little bit. Don’t expect to demolish your opponent’s position with a single blow. Just nudge a piece to a slightly better square. Put the ball in your opponent’s court to come up with a big idea. You might be surprised how well it works out for you.