Theory Thursday: Episode 3--Castling Imbalances

Today I wanted to touch upon the concept of imbalances. This is a huge subject, and there are many books out there that explore this in great depth, so this post will be far from complete, but it should get you pointed in the right direction at spotting these game changers.

By definition (according to IM Jeremy Silman), an imbalance on the chess board occurs when a player has an edge over another. These come up in many different forms; they can be in what pieces have been developed, how well positioned pawns are, whether the king is protected with a castle, or even what parts of the board the pieces are placed on. As you can see, there are many different areas that this concept covers, but one of the more overlooked things is the castling of the king and rook.

The castle is supposed to serve two purposes. The primary one is to protect the king. The king and rook switch positions, usually behind a wall of pawns, tucking the king into a protective corner of the board. But there’s another function, too. When you castle, your rook comes into a more prominent position—and this allows you to play it much more easily.

Castling too early can be disastrous, though. The rule of thumb is that casting on the king side is superior, but if you castle before your opponent has placed their pieces they can adjust their strategy and focus an attack on the king. So while castling is meant to protect the king, if you do it too early or on the wrong side, you are actually making your opponent’s checkmate a little bit easier.

Here’s a quick example.

 

 

As you can see, the king cannot kill the knight on f2 because of the bishop on c5. Nor can the king move to d1 because of the knight's reach. So one possible reaction to this "threat" is to castle. But look at what happens.

 

 

 

One of the rooks will fall victim to the knight's fork, and this is a big imbalance. So while you might be thinking that castling will whisk your king away from the threat, the move creates a material imbalance that will be difficult to recover from. The better reaction here would be to recognize that as long as the h1 rook was moved out of harm's way into g1, the knight in the original diagram does not pose a major threat at this point in the game.