Mating the Castled King - GM Daniel Gormally

Tactics course by GM Daniel Gormally

Includes book, video and PGN
Language: English

Lectures: 6

Total Running Time: 14 hours 33 minutes
From the course:
Every chess player loves to win with a devastating attack. But even beginners know the importance of early castling, so the most significant attacking strategies are those against a castled king.
Grandmaster Danny Gormally sheds light on this vital area of the game, arguing that pattern recognition is key to improvement.
This course strips away the mystique surrounding successful attacking play, and identifies several recurring motifs which can be applied to specific pawn structures and scenarios.
Zero in on your opponent's weakness
Well-chosen model examples and test positions are complemented by the author’s lively writing style.
The exercises are not too difficult and the explanations are pitched at a very good level - just enough variations to make sense of the position, but not too many to make your eyes glaze over. Gormally writes in a very entertaining and picturesque manner: I will never again be able to look at a white pawn on g6 without thinking of the 'Tower of Terror'!
- GM Matthew Sadler, New in Chess

GM Gormally pinpoints three main methods of identifying a weakness when the king is castled and launching the right attack to take its defense apart:
♚ A fast attack;

♚ Playing directly for the attack;

♚ The attack is an indirect consequence of the previous play.
In this entertaining and irreverent course, GM Gormally also teaches you his three concepts to keep in your head:
The Tower of Terror – a satanic monument to evil which has the power to destroy an enemy army on its own.
The Twins of Evil – dreaded harbingers of doom that have often been known to hang out at Terror Tower.
The Shotgun – not to be confused with the Sniper, this is an extremely dangerous weapon that comes in very useful in close encounters.