James Rizzitano Libri

The Najdorf Sicilian has a unique place amongst chess for several decades it has been regarded by the top grandmasters as the best way for Black to play soundly for a win against 1 e4. It was a particular favourite of World Champions Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov, and plays a vital role in the repertoires of current top players such as Viswanathan Anand and Veselin Topalov.Black's stance is totally uncompromising. He accepts no organic weaknesses and stays flexible, ready to counterpunch in any part of the board. White has no safe or easy option. On the other hand, he does have a vast array of extremely dangerous attacking options, such as the old 6 Bg5 main line, which can lead to the Poisoned Pawn, a variation that has undergone much development in the 21st century. The current main line is 6 Be3, intending the English Attack. But given the Najdorf's importance, White has tried almost everything imaginable in the search for an advantage, with considerable bodies of theory evolving for lines that contain merely a drop of poison.In the ever-changing Najdorf landscape, it is easy to lose sight of the strategic backbone that underpins the Najdorf. In this book, James Rizzitano, a battle-hardened Sicilian warrior, distils the most important ideas and themes from current practice to provide an ideal guide for those looking to succeed as White or Black in the Najdorf in the modern scientific era.

James Rizzitano, an experienced international master, has reassessed games from the whole of his career, and in this book presents the lessons from them that will be most relevant to club and tournament players. A common problem for the typical weekend competitor or club player is that his time available for studying chess is very limited. What should he study? Grandmasters from Botvinnik to Yermolinsky have stressed the importance of reviewing and annotating your own games. Rizzitano shows how by doing that you can gain a greater understanding of your strengths and weaknesses, and drawing upon his own experiences, explains how to shape your approach to chess to make the most of your own abilities. Major topics --Developing a reliable and coherent opening repertoire--The importance of understanding opening theory rather than simply memorizing it--Theoretical finding your own and facing the opponent's--Opening selection depending upon the nature of the game and event--Risk management and "playing for a win"--Competing successfully against higher-rated opposition--Accumulating small a safe method when the opponent plays for a draw--The power of the lighting a fire and keeping it burning The book contains more than 60 deeply annotated games.