8 Unbelievable Endgames By Magnus Carlsen

Ladies and gentlemen, to become one of the greatest chess players of all time, all elements of your game, the opening, the middle game, the end game, tactics, strategy, have to be complete. And for Magnus Carlsen, the end game is oftentimes the difference between a win, a loss, or a draw. Frequently when the game is in its fourth, fifth, even sixth hour, when it's at 50 moves, 60 moves, 70 moves, even sometimes up to 100 moves, and players have given up on the position or their endurance is fading, Magnus is fighting on for every half a point, for every point one to point five of an advantage, and trying to find answers in positions where even engines might not see them. And in this video, I have selected eight of potentially hundreds of games over the course of his career that I think stand out. I've included some games that he's played online, some, most of the games that he's played offline, high stakes or just for fun, and I'm going to take you through them, timestamps on the video player. Here we go. Our first example, he's playing against Timur Rajabov, the year is 2013, and he's actually not yet a world champion. He's number one in the world, Magnus Carlsen, but he's playing at the candidates and playing one of the best players in the world. This is the current position. It's move 28. Objectively speaking, this position is equal, but throughout this video, you're going to learn certain terms that you need to keep in mind for the end game in particular, and certain concepts that overlap. Obviously, the pieces are super important. The structure of the pawns is super important. So here, Magnus with the black pieces has these four pawns versus these four pawns. Magnus is slightly more overextended than his opponent. Of course, Rajabov does have the split C and A, which is a bit of a liability, but if you trade this B pawn for the A pawn like this, this C pawn will become a passer. Then you start comparing the quality of the pieces, particularly these two. Clearly in white's favor, the knight can jump to the middle, but more than anything else, you got to start looking around for what's defended and what's not defended. And black is pretty solid. If you get this rook all the way over here, that's very easy to protect. And if you get this rook all the way over here, it attacks nothing. So all end games are determined by the pawn play, potential changes of the structure, certain trades of brooks, knights, bishops, or what it might be, and weaknesses. Weak squares or weak pieces. So Magnus immediately offers the trade of knight, C, to make it A-C-A-C in terms of the structure, where his bishop actually might even be slightly better than Timur's because they both stare at a pawn, but black is the aggressor. So Magnus, throughout this game, seemed like he was getting mildly tortured. Like for the next like 10 moves, I mean, Rajabov is just bringing his king, they freeze up the structure over here on the kingside, watch, the structure gets frozen as the pieces shuffle right there. Frozen structure, those pawns aren't going anywhere. In fact, Magnus with the light-squared bishop might not even like the fact that all his pawns are on light squares, because this bishop could sneak around and get to them, but he's cognizant of that fact. And it looks like only Rajabov can be really playing this position for a win as he's making Magnus' pawns slightly move forward. And then, the critical move comes around move 47-48 right here, when Magnus offers a trade of rooks on b7. Now, Timur can continue to dance around, but he must have not liked something. For example, he's like, if I just play rook to a8, maybe in the future Magnus will somehow put some pressure on this pawn, I don't really, I don't know. So let me just trade these rooks, okay? Let me get down to this position. Still, knight-bishop-6, knight-bishop-6, relatively closed position. So what does Magnus do? Well, he brings his king to the middle, slides the bishop out of the way of the knight so we cannot have that trade any longer, but this bishop permanently supports this and pressures this. Knight goes back to b3, let's centralize our king, and let's utilize a flank pawn advance to take away squares from your king, and potentially your knight, and potentially to even poke at your knight later on down the line. Just, we're just instigating a little bit. Bishop e2, alright, we're shuffling a little bit. Oh, this is my new idea. Do you want to trade bishop for knight? Do you like that or not? But Shabov's like, no, actually I'm good, I don't want to trade. Okay, bishop comes back around, this knight has been kicked out of b3, and the constant concern for white is, is this trade good or bad for me? Like, I don't know, Magnus is posing this practical problem to his opponent throughout this game, as he now shuffles the pieces around one more time. Now the knight is in the middle and the king is here, and c4's under fire, in fact, it's under fire to the point, the only way white can defend against it is to give a check and kick the king out of the middle. And now, where Shabov could play knight to d4, but king d6, and white slowly could run out of moves, and what I mean by that is, if the knight goes back to b3, now Magnus uses that a-pawn. Like, Levi, I don't understand what's going on. Well, folks, now we have the exact same position we had, but c4 cannot be protected. That's the problem, c4 can't be protected now, because I utilized my flank pawn advancement, the subtlety, and the triangulation, you see, black's king can move on three squares. So in moving on three squares, white is being lulled into a state where he's going to overextend the position. So he's going to maybe play the knight to the middle, and get caught, and now he's overextended, he can't go back to where he was, and that's it, Magnus is going to convert this game. So, Rajabov himself plays a4, and oftentimes that's all Magnus needs, and now Magnus completely changes, look, he's triangulating, right? Now he goes to c5, you say, Levi, nothing's changed, oh yes it has, oh yes it has. There is now a fresh weakness on a4, which Magnus made you question the defense of your position, and here Timur sacrifices the pawn, the c-pawn completely, and Magnus plays king c7. You see if Magnus took this, a5 falls, and then maybe a4 falls, but Magnus is like, no no no, we're going to do this on my terms, you're going to take on b6, I'm not letting you get away, this weakness is staying here, you're never getting my a-pawn, and watch, he takes, he plays king a6, moving into the line of sight, by the way, of this bishop, knight a3, king b7, and if you analyze this with an engine, it's constantly going to yell draw draw draw, these guys have no idea what they're doing, they're wasting their time, but Magnus slowly, but surely, slowly but surely transfers his pieces in, at the right moment, even letting this pawn stand, just completely stand, playing knight d3, hits the king, hits the pawn, of course if bishop takes d3, this pawn is going to get through, so the white's knight is completely paralyzed, king goes back to d4, and a few moves later, bishop b5, paralysis, and that a-pawn is surviving, you still can't take it, Timur decides to sacrifice and try to get the knight over to win some pawns, that is a way to try to defend the position, but he's not fast enough, one pawn falls, but the other pawns are now held together by that bishop, which made it all the way around, and on move 89, by gluing it all together, Timur Ajaba resigned, Magnus Carlsen went on to win, and he won this candidates, and he went on to win the world championship, let's go to example 2, second example, his opponent, none other than grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura, and you will see their usernames, so this is spaced out, this is not spaced out, because that's not his legal name, but that's Magnus' online name, this is the speed chess championship in 2018, the finals, and if you look at this position, you might quickly say, Levi, Hikaru's got a bishop, Magnus does not, what the hell is going on? This is from their first segment, 5 minute 2 second bonus, so at this point around in the game, the players both are under a minute, or right about a minute on the clock, but every time they make a move, they gain 2 seconds, so there's no dirty flagging, now Magnus has been down a piece for the majority of this game, he does have 2 pawns for it, he has 6 pawns versus 4, but this is falling, and then the pawn will sacrifice itself, and black will promote, I mean there is no way you're going to hold this position, so Magnus, despite being material down, trades rooks, trades knights, offers a trade of knights to get queen and bishop versus queen, Hikaru instead is like, let's trade queens homie, let's trade queens, because I got a knight and a bishop, Magnus is like, I got him right where I want him, because here's the thing, I have 2 pawns, Magnus in a split second has evaluated that this endgame is actually going to be really difficult for black to win, really, oh, sorry I hit my microphone, I don't know if that actually changed anything, but, so Hikaru does take on g5, because that's the way to go, knight c6, now knight c6 takes away the bishop retreat, and delays the knight from getting back, like, you can go knight d4 here, but then I'm going to play b4, and taking this is a little bit suspicious, just a little bit, I mean you've got to really be able to calculate the fact that bringing the bishop stops every pawn, and then my king running to the middle doesn't give me any practical problems, I mean a4, a5, a6, very quickly comes in, you know, Kf7, a5, Ke6, a6, like it's close, it is a close race, and tough to calculate all this in time trouble, so knight c6, Kf7, here come the pawns, here come the pawns, Bf2, Hikaru's doing everything correctly, everything, he's brought the bishop around, the pawn is going to sacrifice, the king is coming to the defense, so how on earth, b5, how on earth can Magnus possibly save this position, I mean all he's doing is pushing pawns, well, king goes back to c8, Kb3, knight d4 check, and he doesn't take, you see, he could take, or he could not take, but he's got to, he can't take, the truth is like, if he does this, his pawns are never going to get through, now he's Magnus, so obviously he plays Kc4, Kb7, and Hikaru has a really difficult situation here, because if he takes on c6, like he's threatening to take on c6, then it's all good, right, that's why he did it, but if he took on c6 in this position, this is a totally different situation, because now you're too slow, and I have three pawns versus a lone king, and a king now is coming, so, you know, Magnus is just posing more and more practical problems, Kb7, knight b8 check, Ka6, b7, okay, Ka7, a7, Kb7, Kb7, Kb6, now black has one move, one move in this position, Hikaru plays g5, because he doesn't see that white has any threat, white does have a threat, Nf7, you see, Levy, I don't understand, just bishop comes back, and I'm going to push my pawn, my bishop is going to cover, well this is the idea, to take, and then to give this check, the king has to go back to b8, it can't take the pawn, because the pawn promotes, and now we come here, and Nd7 is unstoppable, and there is no piece that can protect the king on b8, and Hikaru resigns, now, you might sit there and say, Levy, this is, this is, what is this, this is terrible, I mean, it got so lucky, it's a blitz game, it doesn't matter, no, he's playing one of the, he's playing, I mean, Hikaru and Magnus Carlsen are the two best speed chess players in the world, a guy has an extra bishop, and Magnus manages to pose 25 moves of practical calculation problems in a situation no other person has any business drawing, let alone winning, now, of course, Hikaru had to blunder, in all these endgames that you're going to watch today, a person had to mess up, but that's what, that's what the point of this video is about, this guy has a wizard-like touch to certain positions to just make them incredibly difficult, I understand you can put these positions into stockfish and go, oh, he messed up, he's so bad, I mean, what, what a stupid video, do try, you know how many pieces you would hang in this endgame, you'd hang a, you would find a way to hang a rook in this position, there are no rooks on the board, that's how skilled you are, let's go to example number three, okay, this game I actually covered live, this is 2019, we're in Granja, in the, in the chess festival, fantastic tournament, by the way, and Magnus' opponent is Francisco Vallejo Ponce, who's number one player from Spain, maybe not currently, I think maybe David Anton Guijarro is number one, but, I mean, Vallejo's incredible player, and this game is not, like, super exciting, so we're gonna fast forward to around the middle game, like move 25, when the balance of this position is completely equal, it's been completely equal for a long time, Magnus has the black pieces, white is slightly, white looks like they're more active with this bishop and this knight, but black has some activity as well, this pawn on d4, you know, the bishop, the opposite colored bishops, notice the opposite colored bishops, not the same situation as in the Rajabov game, and so Magnus, just, just watch, I'm not even gonna say anything, just watch, brings his king, bishop here, sets up, like, an infiltration of the rook, which would pry apart the defense of the king and the knight, so the knight goes there, and then the king comes forward, Magnus understands that while one of his rooks is extremely passive, and he can't even kick the knight out, because the knight would jump into c6, his defensive skills are there, the position's balanced, he might have a mildly unpleasant situation right here on the queen side, as kind of one enemy piece controls the movement of four, because this bishop doesn't really have any movement, this knight constantly threatening to jump in and hit everybody, it looks like white is actually a little bit happier here, he plays g3, so Magnus can't really come forward with any pieces, so what's the man gonna do? He's the goat, what's he gonna do? Pawn takes c3, first he takes, he tries to make some trades, takes, takes, and he swamps off one of the, but now, he finds the only moment he has had to activate this rook, the only moment, because now he can't, he can't lose this pawn, right? So what does white do? He plays f4 check, that's a really nice move actually, because black has a very unpleasant decision to make, does he take en passant, or does he just back up? If you play king h6, it's a very, very bad decision, because this bishop reactivates, you now have to play very passively, you lose b7, everything falls apart. So you take en passant, takes en passant, but now it looks like Vallejo has activated his bishop, and this pawn is really tough to defend, so Magnus has no intention of defending it, full on activity, fight fire with fire, not actually, I don't know, maybe, any firefighters in the comment section? Now it's a tough decision, do you take on h4, or do you take with the knight, or do you take with the bishop? The engine gives bishop, but that's a very strange move to make, to just wander off, and allow your own king to just completely come under fire with f2 over here, you want to play something like a rook e2, you might end up in some trouble, so he decides to go back to c4, to prevent the rook from coming to d2, and potentially doing serious damage along the second rank with the bishop. In this moment, Magnus decides to trade, and slides right out of there to b8, so he's completely giving up the queen side, he's completely giving it up, go ahead and take it, you gotta take it, or you gotta, what are you gonna do about g3? Vallejo decides to defend, and the second he has a moment, he immediately makes white question everything that he's doing. Now we have a trade, goes back, material's still equal by the way, I mean, all this momentum, it's still equal material, but now rook d2 check, king h3, rook d3, and we have a little bit of a transformation. Both queen side pawns fall, leaving the players with just rooks, knight, bishop, and a pawn each, and this move comes, f4. Now we have a problem, because if you take, you lose your rook to fork, if you don't take, what's gonna happen to your, what's gonna happen? Well, Vallejo finds a very interesting move here, he plays bishop to e8 attacking the knight, which leads to the rook being attacked, and now a transformation of a position very soon coming, f takes g3, and some moves later, instead of trading rooks, because of course you need that pawn on the board, we have a big transformation after rook b4, we have knight e6, rook g4, and here it comes, bishop takes g2, knight f4 check. So if you play king h2, you walk into this, if you play king here, you just lose the bishop for free. So Vallejo goes for this endgame. King bishop knight versus king rook bishop. Now this is six pieces on the board, so something called a table base here gives a full evaluation, I believe of a draw. It says that it would take black about 75 moves to win this position, which is not allowed, because there's a 50 move rule, no trades, and no advancements of pawns, there are no pawns. Well, this wouldn't be a Magnus Carlsen game if we didn't see how he did it, so he plays bishop back to b8. Now this position is littered with so many different variations and possibilities, we're just gonna watch how Magnus does it. Any one of white's moves now is a problem, and rook h8 is constantly, rook h2 is constantly being threatened, so the knight blocks the rook's path, the bishop slides forward. The king now comes back, okay? So king comes forward, the second you back up, I'm coming forward, you can't really move so easily, we slide over here, I give you a check, king goes to e1, bishop e3, I'm suffocating you. Where are your moves? King d1? Alright, king g5, where are you going? Where are you going? Bishop e4? Okay. Now I'm trying to bring my king, bishop f3. Now this looks like black is making a lot of progress, it really does, looks like he's making a lot of progress. So first, he cuts you off horizontally, sorry, vertically. So the defense that you've been employing of shuffling your king isn't gonna work so easily. I gotta get your king out. The way you win this position is you make that king feel really, really sad on the back rank, and white runs out of defensive moves. So bishop to e4, now king c4, here comes the king, king f1, rook here. Where's white going? If you go back to where you were, which looks very natural, I don't know, maybe you suffer something. Do you run away from your knight, and then let this check happen? King h1! King to h1 is the only defense, because this check is a stalemate trap. Vallejo has to find a sacrifice of both his pieces, and putting his king voluntarily to the corner, which is not so easy to do and move 66 of this game probably 6 hours into it. He plays king to e1. How is Magnus gonna make progress? You obviously don't want to play this. How does that make sense? Now the king is just gonna go out this way, or potentially into the line of fire again. I don't know. Are you just gonna repeat moves? So he does that. King d2, check. I don't understand. Bishop e3. So what? Everything is defended. Or is it? Knight c1 check, king to a3, knight e2, check, here, and the killer. The rook all the way back. The silent move, on a surface there's not even a threat, but white has no moves. If you move the knight, then this comes. So that's game over. If you move the bishop, this comes. I just slide all the way back. I paralyzed your king, I pried the king apart from the other pieces, and unlike the other position where the king is lost in the corner, here you're in the corner of my bishop, which is the way you have to win this. You have to get the king in the corner of the bishop, so it could be check, and that's how Magnus did it. Let's go to example four. Now we are in Riyadh, and Magnus is playing Vladimir Fedoseev, very strong grandmaster from Russia, in the World Rapid Championship. This is the twelfth round, and it's been a pretty boring game thus far, plus it's a late endgame of a rapid game, they probably don't have a huge amount of time. Of course, evaluation, 0-0-0. Queen-bishop, queen-knight. In fact, queen and knight is an even more scary combination, so you could argue Fedoseev has the advantage here. Plus he's got both pawns doubled, and completely stopping these pawns, but more importantly they're on dark squares. So this bishop has no role in the game. So how do you play this position? The real problem from Fedoseev is that he's playing Magnus Carlsen. If he was playing me, for example, he might be a little bit more aggressive here, but he knows that he needs to contain the beast. So Magnus throws out a pawn. Now with pawns in endgames, you need to be very careful. If you play the f-pawn forward, that is a massive mistake. You say, Levi, what? What's the difference? Well, you have a light-squared bishop. You're a lot weaker on the dark squares. So if white can create a blockade on dark squares, did I say you're weaker on dark squares? I think I said that. What's going to happen is white is going to play queen e3, let's say you play king f7, and then put a knight on e5, and then you're going to die. No one can fight that knight, and then the queen will run over here, and the king will completely hide on h2. All three things in common about e5, a7, h2, dark squares, because the light-squared bishop can't participate. So Magnus understands that his structure needs to be a dark-squared structure, to the point that as this game progresses, and the players shuffle their pieces, not trading, and they could trade queens, they could trade queens, but they're not doing it. They're trying to figure out what's going on. Look what Magnus does. This is Fedeseev's mistake number one, is he allowed this. Now it's still equal. It's still very equal, because both sides have a very weak king. Like if Fedeseev comes into c8, for example, he probably could draw this game. He could probably just go for perpetual check, but he's got the knight, they got a little time. Let's see what happens. King to f7. Wait, I thought we weren't trading queens. Of course, if you're a human, but he's Magnus Carlsen. So king to e7, knight c2, a little shuffling, you know, you know how it is. f4. Wait, why did Fedeseev do that? Well, Fedeseev played the move f4, because if he just plays knight c2, Magnus activates his king, and again, the mistake Fedeseev made, putting all his pawns on light squares. That's the mistake. He can't abandon those pawns. Like if his knight ventures over here, and his king ventures too far forward, no one's going to be able to guard g2, h3, and then he's going to lose. So he's kind of a little bit more passive, but he's probably thinking he's fine, because there's no way for Magnus to get in. His king can't eat his own bishop, and even if he could, that would be a really stupid decision, right? So he decides to play f4, and Magnus trades on his own terms. He's like, you take me. And I'm still constantly threatening bishop f1. So knight f3, bishop d5. Now I have a new threat. At some point, I could take this knight, like this. I could take this knight, and now I'm winning. So I have a constant threat of now trading with you on my terms, because your knight is guarding my entranceway into your position, right? So knight d4 check, and the bishop goes back to b7, king f5, and Fedeseev's like, let me get rid of one more of my weaknesses. Magnus is like, okay, cool, bishop c8. I'm going to make you constantly hesitant, constantly. You come give me check, I might run over there and get those pawns before you have an opportunity to get in here. And even if you do, you're not attacking anything. The good thing about a bishop, it can serve two jobs at the same time from the corner of the board. Knight back to d2, bishop b7, bishop d5. You're slowly running out of moves, right? At some point, I'm going to make a king. I'm going to make a run with my king. That's what I'm going to do. I'm going to put my bishop on the right square, and then I'm going to run with my king. Now, do you go back? What are you doing? You're going to go back? Take my pawn. Go ahead. Take my pawn. Okay. Hi. Who's going to protect your queenside pawns? Oh, nobody? Okay. Well, that's great. Now I have two on one. And Fedoseev here has to find the right defensive schematic against black's plan. Black's plan is as follows. Move the king, push both pawns. White needs a knight on b1 and a king on c1. That is virtually impossible to figure out, probably with no time on the clock. The only way to draw this? King e3. And cocoon defense like this. That is the only way to draw because you stop a3, and the trade never works because you have an h-pawn. But Fedoseev, naturally, out of inertia, just slides his king forward, I mean, sorry, right over to the next square instead of diagonally back. And now it's losing. Now this endgame is losing because of exactly this reason that knight b1 does not come with the defense of the knight. Knight e4, king d5, and Magnus uses his final remaining queenside pawn to break through. And the finish to this game is really something beautiful. Because it really looks like black has been completely thwarted, and as long as you sack this pawn, it's going to be stalemate. This position with knight on c2, bishop c2, will be stalemate as long as there's no pawn, right? Gotta be. It's gotta be. Here comes... Oh, perfect. But you're playing Magnus. You're playing Magnus. He's not going to stalemate you. He's going to run you out of moves. Knight c2 now I take, and if king d2, king b2. Bye-bye. It's very valiant of this knight to fight on to the bitter end on move 87, but it's game over. And that's how Magnus won this endgame. Let's go to example 5. This game happened, like, six days ago. Or something like that. Magnus versus Ali Reza Firuja, Norway Chess 2021. This is a classical game. Long time control game. It's been a pretty calm Ruelopas. And Ali Reza here activated his knight from the corner of the board. And Magnus said, oh, he didn't actually say that, they were sitting in a quiet room, but he trades. The craziest thing is, then he traded all the rooks. Now that is kind of surprising, because it's bishop and six versus bishop and six. But it's anything but over. It's anything but over. Why? What have you learned so far about from this video? Have you learned anything? What, are you watching, like, 25 minutes of this video, you haven't learned anything? Structure. Weaknesses. Bishop complexes, right? Light-squared bishop versus light-squared bishop. With six pawns apiece. These things are going to be a big liability. And the outside pass pawn pressure, the pressure over here to potentially trade the right way, Magnus is going to start putting some pressure. So first he plays f4, which is an important move. Then he brings his king, and then he plays b4 so the king can't go to c5. Okay, nothing complicated. I mean, you have play against the light-squared bishop, and potentially you want to get over here. Like, the easiest way to win this is to do this, okay? And white wins, right? Because you get to a6. In a nutshell, I mean, actually in this particular case, maybe black is a little bit quick with counterplay and you can get your bishop stuck, because this king gets here fast enough. But that, in a nutshell, is the problem for black. And for white, you'll defend this and make sure that you don't lose this pawn, right? So let's go back. Bishop d5 is a nice centralizing move. In fact, one would argue that black's bishop is significantly better than white's bishop. And one would actually argue correctly. But the problem is that this is such a liability, there's no easy way to defend it. Alireza plays the move h6, because to Alireza, a perfect structure would revolve around g5. So for example, king e3, this is not good for Magnus. Now his two pawns are on light squares, just like those two pawns, he's never getting h4. And a really bad trade for black would be to end up in a position like, hypothetically, if you got this, this, versus this. So if this happened, like g3, h6, and this, this would be awful for black. This is lost, because you now have a two-on-one to create an outside pass pawn. This outside pass pawn will win white the game. So outside pass pawn is a concept that you need to be familiar with. Both these guys are familiar with it, which is why Magnus just throws his pawn to g5, and immediately gets the outside pass pawn situation. But you see the difference here? Black is gonna play g6 at some point. The second that white plays h4, black is gonna play g6, don't believe me? Look, g6. He had to do it, because if he didn't, if he just did this, now I'm gonna get the outside pass pawn. But the way Alireza plays g6, this is never gonna happen. h5 just results in a bishop, and you're never gonna get through a pawn with another pawn. Or maybe you will, I don't know. Watch the game. Bishop g4. Threat is to go to c8. Alireza tries to trade bishops. Now a bishop trade would be incorrect, because actually now black is winning. Black is winning, you heard me right. Because wherever the king moves, the black king is gonna run. So if the king goes to f3, you slide out of the way, you push your pawn, you win both these pawns. If the king goes over here, I don't know, maybe king d5 is still winning. But you would just go over here, you win these pawns anyway. So h5, Levi, you just said you can't break through a pawn with a pawn. Yeah, well, like I said, I mean, in many of these videos, it's equal until it's not. Bishop goes to f3. Now if you take on g5, boom, boom, boom, or boom, boom, slide out, a pawn promotes. So Alireza plays back to c8. And for a brief moment, Magnus is now down a pawn. He's down two to three. But because his king is more active, and active in the right way, he's still creating practical problems. It's insane. It's kind of insane. His king just goes, it just goes to c7. Because he's defending against the advancement from the black position, f4. He's not going to c7, he comes back. Because black is gonna run out of moves. Black is defending on something known as the short side. So he's glued over here, he's gonna run out of moves. Either his king has to lose the pawn, or his bishop moves and allows bishop to b7. So he decides to lose this pawn. The engine gives some crazy line where you can actually allow bishop b7. And you can go to f1 and defend this pawn from the other side. But I mean, you know, king g6. Now we have the same position, but now Magnus is completely equal of material by using short side defense. And he's able to infiltrate. I think somewhere around here Alireza might have messed up. But I think it's already, I think his defense was that he had to go like this. Is he had to keep the f-pawn and defend from the other side, if I'm not mistaken. Because the way this ends up is the a6 pawn is won, and this is simply losing. And a few moves later, Magnus got his advantageous exchange. And you would wonder, why didn't Magnus just push here? He has to utilize maneuvering. He has to get the bishop out of position. If it goes to a6, for example, now it's frozen. And this is something known as zugzwang. One player just has to surrender the right of way to the other. So what he does is he makes the bishop move. And now makes it move again. Because he wants to get to the center diagonal. And the game is over because the pawn will just go. That's how we beat Alireza. This is a fun game that I decided to include. It's from a game that Magnus played online in like a random banter blitz thing. And his opponent is rated 2400 blitz. And begins the game with a really funny move order. So Magnus plays queen e5 check, which is like a silly variation of the Scandinavian defense. And his opponent goes here. Offering a queen trade. So Magnus trades and says, why is this guy offering a queen trade? Doesn't he know that I'm supposed to be the greatest endgame player of all time? There's a clip on YouTube of this. Then he obviously just says that he's kidding. But he's not. So let's see how he wins an endgame with relatively symmetrical queen trade position. But just an imbalance of d for e being traded. Yes, we're actually going to look at the full game. Not in excruciating detail. But first things first, he offers an immediate exchange. Bishop for knight. Pawn loss in the middle for pawn loss on g2. This transformation would actually result like something like this. This would actually result in white having a decent position. But that's what Magnus is after. He's after that imbalance, right? Plus he's also playing a blitz game talking to the chat. Castle's long. That's his first decision. And now he creates, well his opponent doesn't let him get out of the way here. Continues to be symmetrical. Okay, let's instigate with our pawns. Kick this bishop back here. And go get the bishop pair. Okay, now we are in a bit of a fusion of an endgame with a middle game. But bishop c6. And now another pretty fascinating decision. To trade the bishop pair for opposite colored bishops. This position is better for black. Because black has more space. And black has more activity. This bishop, the quality is better than the bishop on c5 which attacks nothing. Magnus has already concocted a structure here to counteract this bishop. And now this knight. A flank pawn push will be utilized to attack the structure of white. When an opponent doesn't want to engage. How do you beat them? Well first you have to name Magnus Carlsen, right? So knight f5. Rook g1 h5. Black is combining a dark squared blockade against the dark squared bishop. With a flank pawn advancement. In fact, Magnus advances with flank pawns on both sides. Because he controls the middle. And now he controls the king side and the queen side. f3 is a very solid move. h4. Now g4 is the way Magnus makes you pay. He en passant you. And now he controls the file, right? So he's won a little bit of control already. Probably white things that are going to play rook h1. But he comes in. Now if you play the move rook h1. What Magnus is going to do. He might not even take on h1. But he can. He can. Then he can take your knight and your pawn. But what he can do. Is when you play rook h1. He's going to add a layer of defense. And now he'll trade off. And this rook is not going anywhere. Which is going to be a really big problem, right? So g4 is a counterplay measure. But there you go. You've now in your attempts to cocoon and play defensively. Have given yourself an irreparable weakness. So now we have a rook trade and this. Now black to his credit does get rook h7. But you have to combine strategic play and tactical play in endgames, right? So the counterplay here. The calculation. Here comes the counterplay. But Magnus is so fast. Just kidding. He plays a really solid defensive move here. But he could have actually played takes. And just given this up completely. Knight g5. To get the e4 pawn. This is clean. Magnus is just calmly winning here. But there's something even more brutal. Which is this move. Ouch. And that's how he could have defended the pawn indirectly. Which is really difficult to see. But you know. He won a pawn. He now stabilizes. And he trades like this. Where his opponent has the two split pawns. And his knight just has to find a way home. So king d7. Knight d4. Takes, takes. Just stabilizing everything. Now to white's credit. White was pretty resourceful here. With trying to look for counterplay. If you take on c4. This can become a little bit of a liability. So Magnus has to take en passant twice in one game. By the way. Now he's got king in five. And a rook versus king in four. And a rook. How's he gonna win it? Rook e8. There it is. Outside passer. We're coming. c4 a4. You've seen this already. We don't even take back on b5. We don't even take the free pawn. Because it stops being guarded by the rook. And the distance is closer to the king. We don't take the pawn. We go like this. And now the rook has to go over here. This is a very well-known defensive situation. Where one side is completely glued to the pawn. And the other king is gonna go have a picnic. So after king to e5. Mr. Alichess resigned. And we'll never make the mistake again. Of trading queens on like the fifth move of the game. Against the Goat of Endgames. Example number seven. We are in Nice in France. It's the year 2010. So it's babyface Magnus. And we're gonna jump ahead to move 30. It was a relatively tame. Most of the games actually from this video are E485 games. I mean it's SuperGMs. What are you gonna do, right? So we go to move 30. It's a double rook endgame with six pawns each. There is a fundamental imbalance of the structure. In the middle where it's ED versus DC. Everything else is the same. So how do you play an endgame like this? Important pawn advancements to take space. Right? Now Aronian immediately tries to get rid of his own weakness here. By playing the move c5. White can take en passant. We see a lot of en passant from Magnus. Cultured individual. Frequence. Anarchy chess. The problem with the way that you do this. Is you leave yourself two weaknesses. So Magnus using the open b file now. Threatening to get into b7. Threatening to potentially get to b6 where he hits everything. It's just gonna make Aronian's life annoying. Rook c8. Rook d3. You try to get aggressive with me. Do I want to rook trade? Maybe not yet. Okay. I think I have to now. Rook a4. So he's going for a6. If I know that Magnus Carlsen is going for a6. I gotta grab a pawn myself. But Magnus understands that all he needs is one pass pawn. Now he has his pass pawn. And the rest of the board is e f g versus f g h. And this random d pawn. Which doesn't really serve anybody any benefit. It really wants to prefer to be with those four pawns. Because it has no other way of joining the attack right. So we kick the rook out and we play a4. Play f3. And now we bring our king up. We have to make sure that the king is coming up. Right. So rook a2. a5. Rook a3. But what's gonna. How is Magnus actually gonna win this position? Because the thing is. He can't move his rook anywhere. Because this pawn is gonna get taken. So how on earth is he. What's he gonna do? I don't understand. Okay. Congratulations. You pushed your pawn all the way. Check doesn't ever work. Okay. f4. What Magnus is gonna do now is try to deflect the king. So if the king ever tries to walk over here. There's this trick. If you take. Here. Game over. And if you don't take. I just promote. So Aronian's not gonna do that. He's just gonna keep giving checks. Magnus says. I am a king. But I also have a king. Hello. So if Aronian does nothing. Okay. Let's just allow this king. Oop. Well. We know that loses. If the king walks over to b2. This is very unpleasant. If the rook tries to hang out. The king is now gonna walk up. And if the rook comes all the way down. The king is gonna walk up. And at some point. What's gonna happen is. If you start giving checks like this. Then I'm gonna run my king sideways. And potentially break you in. Like. Break down the middle. Somehow. With one of these pawns. Because I can't really hide right now. That's sort of the thing. So I'm gonna walk my king over to you. And make sure that you can't check me. And then we're gonna try to figure it out. With one of these pawns. One of these. Maybe e5 will break through. You say. How does that change anything? Well. My king is gonna be able to hide a little bit more. And I'm gonna have a tactic here. So for example. Here I have. Oops. If king takes. Rook e8. And if pawn takes. The same trick. Because by sacrificing the pawn. You've opened up the entire seventh rank. That's Magnus' idea. So he plays king e2. Aronian kind of is like. You know what? I'm not too afraid. I got a pass pawn right here. Hello. H5. Oh. All right. H4. Magnus is like. I got you. I wasn't actually going to your rook. I was faking. For you to over commit. And now I'm gonna chase your h-pawn down. Aronian apparently had to give a check. Before playing h4. So that he controlled the second rank. Very tricky. Now. I've caught you. Yes. I'm paralyzed in the corner of the board. But you need to guard my a-pawn. So you go over there. And I'm gonna keep pushing. And now I've locked your king in a box. Your king has no legal moves. What's gonna happen is. Your pawn and rook. Will also have no legal moves. And now I play this. What? But what about this? Now I take on h2. Your king still has no legal moves. And now. I bring my king. And what's gonna happen? I'm gonna run out of squares. I'm gonna go to d5. And you're gonna die a slow death. And really brutal here. The king gets to f8. Magnus ends this game. By trapping the h-pawn. And then walking the king. The rest of the game. Up the board. And giving him a little bunker. Over here. And Aronian resigned. He resigned because rook to e7. And the game is over. Brutal. And the final example. This game is from the Skilling Open Playoffs in 2020. Magnus is playing against Aneesh Giri. I featured games on this channel. Where Aneesh does defeat Magnus Carlsen. But unfortunately not in this game. Joen Ludwig Hammer. Who's one of the strongest players of Norway. Was I think covering this game live in Norwegian. And said that this is one of the best games. That Magnus Carlsen has ever played. Which is that's pretty big praise. Now we're gonna pick this up on move 10. Because on move 10 already. The biggest commitment of the position occurs. With the move d4. Now d4 opens up some really nasty tactical complications. Which Magnus meets by completely giving away the pawn on e5. He should just take it. Goes here. That's an important move. Because it attacks f2. And after bishop to e3. He takes. And he's still not winning the pawn back on e5. But he does this. He damages his own pawn structure. And is a pawn down. So you're supposed to take toward the center. He leaves his bishop out here. He has isolated three pawns. This a5 pawn is doing god knows what. But the craziest thing about this position. Is that after the trade of queens. It is anything but simple. Because when the position transforms. After rook to e2. Which seems like it guards everything. Rather than just applying pressure with a rook or the bishop. Magnus says my bishop is good. But you could have it. Here's the problem. If you take with the rook. Then you allow me to hang around on the second rank. And then for example rook e2. There might be rook d8. It's not going to be easy for you to get rid of my rook. And if you can't get rid of my rook. How are you going to get rid of both of my pieces. Which stare at you. And it gets even worse. At a certain point I'm going to go here. Where does this bishop go? Either hangs out on the edge of the board. Or goes back to f1. If you go back to f1. You might as well resign. Outside pass pawn. I'm going to go for a2. You don't let me have a2. I'm going to go for c3. Then I'll definitely get one of these pawns. So rather than allowing Magnus any activity. Anish decides. My rook will patrol the whole rank. But I will make a double pawn. I don't really want to. But in the future. I could put a rook on d4. Undouble my pawn. And I'll be good to go. Magnus. Middle of the board. Rooks and bishops. Just brings his king. He just brings his king. Just brings it directly to the middle of the board. He then coordinates his bishop and his rook like this. If you ever play the move b3. I just back up. Nice bishop buddy. Yeah you want to go c4. That's very cute. Bye. You're going to lose this bishop. And if you want to go here. Well this bishop will never move again. And I'll put my king on e5. Look at this position. In fact. A few moves later. Magnus did win king of the hill. In the middle of an endgame. With rooks and bishops. Down a full pawn. He won. He wins king of the hill. By just marching his king to e5. One of his rooks completely dominates the f-file. One of his rooks dominates the center. And pressures everything. And this bishop is standing nice and pretty. But the question is. How do you win an endgame like this? To win an endgame. Much like the last one. You need to trade one pair of rooks. Oftentimes the defensive side will struggle. With less forces. Especially if they're under a lot of pressure. So two rooks actually. Believe it or not. Is good for defense. It's not always great. To trade rooks. If you're trying to. If you're trying. I just talked myself into a corner. If you're trying to win. You want to trade one pair of rooks. But not both. Cool? Cool. King f2. Rook d6. Bishop c4. Poking at your pawn. What are you going to do? Ah. You've committed a pawn move. Well I'm going to fly in with my rook. Check. This is under fire. Why aren't you defending it? Well if you defend it. I was going to go here. So. Well there's no point defending it anyway. King g3. And now I just slide right back. You can't guard this. If you can't guard this. How are you going to guard this? If you can't guard that. I'm going to promote with my a pawn. It's so depressing. It's just a depressing position. So he takes on a2. Now we want to bishop trade. Let me go get that second pawn. And now it's more or less straightforward. Four moves. Four pawn captures. That's how bad Anisha's position was made by Magnus. He took a2. He took b3. He took e4. He took e3. Have you ever seen that? It's like Pac-Man. He just takes everything. And now he's winning. I mean. He doesn't. I could win this endgame with black. Even I could. Because it's up two pawns. Take stakes. Rook b2. Calm move. You could go have all these pawns. All of them. Take every single one. Boom. My a pawn's going. Outside passer. And um. Rook b6. Actually Magnus just for good measure decided to defend. Although I'm pretty sure even a4 is just winning. But he's like. Just like in the last game. Let me uh. Let me not let Anisha even take anything. And there it is. a3. a2. We have seen this before in the game against Alichess. But this game. Just out of inertia. Anisha makes a couple more moves. And Magnus walks over. And Anisha resigns. This was a wild one. The cost of material with the open board. And then giving up your bishop. Because of a such a difficult practical decision that white has to make. And he's chosen correctly. And that. Is how Magnus Carlsen defeated Anish Giri in this game. Folks. As always. I want to thank you for making it this far in the video. It was a long one. 49 minutes of footage at the time of recording. Uh. Could be a 30 to 40 minute video. Please let me know if you want me to make any sort of future content. About strongly strong players. But Magnus Carlsen. Is a god of end games for a reason. Peace out. I will see you in the next video. Get out of here.