British Chess Magazine

BCM has a unique focus on the British chess scene while covering major news and events internationally. Readers will enjoy coverage of the important annual Hastings and Gibraltar Masters tournaments and the British Chess Championship in particular. The chess world deserves a magazine like today’s BCM with its great content, great design, great photography, and simply great value. BCM will truly engage you and also provide real help to players eager to improve their play. We have deep authoritative analysis by leading GM and IM chess professionals. BCM's goal is to entertain, inform and offer the best in high-class chess insight, stories and research. And a touch of glamour!

BRITISH CHESS MAGAZINE

TWO 20-YEAR-OLDS, ONE TITLE, AND A FORM GAP THAT COULD DECIDE EVERYTHING

THE BEAUTIFUL GAME’S QUIET COUNTERWEIGHT • Harry Kane lost on time to GothamChess two days after winning the Ballon d’Or. Mohamed Salah plays almost every day and calls the habit an addiction that “takes your mind away from football.” Behind the dressing-room games and online ratings, football’s biggest names are now both switching off on the board and writing the cheques that are turning chess into a spectator product.

THE SCHOOLBOY’S GUIDE TO MIKHAIL TAL • Long before the engine age, the quickest way to improve was to pick a hero and try to play like him. For a generation of English schoolboys, that hero was Mikhail Tal

Problem World

ENGLAND’S SENIORS SHINE IN CRETE • England were very successful in the European Senior Teams winning the over 50s and being edged out on tie break in the overs 65s. The England 1 team in the over 50s were Conquest, Emms, Gormally, Hebden and Buckley. The England 1 Team in the over 65s were Nunn, Kosten, Pigott and Povah

PLAYING ON ONE COLOR COMPLEX • Control one color, and the position often follows. Learn how concentrating your forces on a single color complex can transform a small weakness into a lasting strategic advantage.

Bernard Cafferty • 27 VI 1934 BLACKBURN – 4 XI 2026 HASTINGS

WOOD GREEN INVITATIONAL • Shreyas Royal took the sixth Wood Green Invitational in Stafford with 7/9, a point clear of the field and a performance of 2611, half a point ahead of Alexander Kovchan and a point and a half clear of the rating favourite, Michael Adams.

QUOTES AND QUERIES ODDITIES OF THE 19TH CENTURY: Steinitz, Morphy and a Duke who wasn’t weak • Not every 19th-century curiosity involves Morphy crushing amateurs. Sometimes the oddities are subtler - and more revealing

Endgame Studies