Anybody Can Play Chess

Chess Board and Pieces Setting up

Hi, Welcome to Central Chess Academy. If you want to play a game of
chess and don’t know how to play chess, otherwise, if you want to teach
your kids chess, you have walked into the right place. This is Central
Chess Academy, here we teach Chess. My name is Varghese and I am a
dedicated Chess Coach.
Chess is a game of War and strategy. War between White and Black
otherwise light and dark armies. The two armies approach each other,
fight for territories and position, removing enemy chessmen from the
chess board by capturing them, and ultimately attack and surround their
opponent’s King. When the King is under attack and cannot escape,
historically an army would surrender. In chess we call it checkmate.
Chess may be challenging enough to learn and become a good player.
But actually, it is easy to learn but may take time to master the game as
its principles are vast and deep reaching. It’s my promise that I will teach
you chess within half of an hour’s time. You will be able to play a game
of chess within a half of an hour’s time.
We will learn together about the Chess Board and its initial setting up
like placing the Board, peculiarities of the Board and combination of
squares like ranks, files, diagonals and square names. Then I teach about
initial piece set up. After that we will learn the rules of chess like touch
and move, capture, moves of Kings, Queens and other pieces and Pawns,
etc. We also learn here how to write down a game of chess on a score
sheet. All these are taught in a structured manner.
Here is the first article in the series Anybody Can Play Chess. You play a
Chess game on a Chess Board. Therefore, let’s learn today about the
chess board.
Chess is an intellectual competition between two players. It is played on
an equilateral square board divided into 64 equal squares that are
alternately light and dark or of contrasting colours. Two Players begin
the game with a reliable army of 16 pieces: a King, a Queen, two Rooks,
two Bishops, two Knights and eight Pawns.
Before we place our pieces, we need to set the Board properly. The Chess
Board is placed between two players showing that the lower right
corner of each player has a white (or light) square. Let’s remember this
with – Light on Right!
Now we are going to learn about Ranks, Files, and Diagonals on the
Board. The squares on the chessboard do not exist in isolation. They
touch or intersect at various points, creating lines across the board.
These combinations of squares on the Board are called ranks, files, and
diagonals.
RANKS: As you sit at the chessboard, there are eight horizontal rows of
eight squares bordering at the sides, stretching from your left to your
right and these are known as Ranks. The rank nearest from White’s side
is called the first rank. The next rank is called the second rank, the next
the third rank, and so on until you get to the rank nearest your opponent,
which is the eighth rank. If you are playing the Black pieces, the rank
nearest you is the eighth rank and the rank nearest your opponent is the
first rank. So you got eight ranks starting from 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 & 8 from
White’s side across the board from left to right.
Now let’s learn about FILES: As you sit at the chessboard, with a light
square at your right and a dark square at your left, there are eight
vertical rows of squares stretching from you to your opponent. These
vertical combinations of squares are called files.
Each file has names beginning with letter ‘a’ and ending at ‘h’. Assuming
you are playing the White pieces, counting from your left, the files are a-
file, b-file, c-file, and on to the file furthest to your right is the h-file.
Assuming you are ready to play the Black pieces, counting from your left
the files are the h-file, the g-file, the f-file, and on to the file furthest to
your right is the a-file.
Now let’s see what Diagonals are: Diagonals are straight lines made up
of individual squares that border at the corners rather than at the sides.
They extend at an angle rather than straight across or up and down the
board. The number of squares in a diagonal varies from two to eight,
whereas ranks and files always contain eight squares each. Diagonals
consist of squares of one colour only, whereas ranks and files always
contain a mixture of both dark and light squares. Diagonals don’t have
simple, easy-to-remember names like ranks and files do. But they are
named for the first and last square on the diagonal: The longest dark
diagonal can be called the a1–h8 diagonal, while the smallest light-
square diagonals can be called the h7–g8 diagonal and the a2–b1
diagonal.
Piece Set up
Chess is a war game and the force or army is its chessmen or we call
them material or Chessmen. A chessman means either a pawn or a piece.
We normally don’t call a pawn -a chess piece. The pieces are Rook,
Knight, Bishop, Queen and the King. At the beginning of the game, white
Pawns stand on the second rank while black pawns are on the seventh
rank. Thus each side at the start of a game has eight pawns and eight
pieces. The first Row on the Board is occupied by the White Pieces and
Black Pieces take the 8th Rank or Row of the Board. The Second Row on
the Board is taken by White Pawns and Black Pawns take the 7th Row on
the Board.
Each player has 16 chessmen at the beginning of a game; 16 White and
16 Black. All 32 make up a chess set. One of the players has the White
men and the other the Black men. There are 6 kinds of chessmen - 5
types of pieces namely Rook, Knight, Bishop, Queen, King and the pawns.
The Rooks start on the corner squares. Next to the Rooks, it is the
Knights, the warrior of the game. The Bishops are counsels of the King
and Queen and they stand close to them and next to the Knights. Take
care when you place the King and Queen. The Queens are fashion
conscious and take their places on the square which has the same colour
in the centre of the row and close to the King. The white Queen is on the
white square and the black queen is on the facing black square at the
beginning of the game. The Kings take the remaining square — White
King on Dark Square, Black King on Light Square, in the centre of the
row.
Each side’s eight pawns are placed on the row of squares in front of their
pieces.
If an imaginary line is drawn vertically down the middle of the board
both the Queens would appear on one side of the board while both the
Kings would be on the other side. That half of the board containing both
Queens is called the “Queenside” and the other half, containing both the
Kings, is known as the “Kingside.” White’s Kingside is always on his right
and Black’s Kingside is always on his left. This is never changed, no
matter where the Kings and Queens move on the board during the game.
Moves
The move of every kind of chessman is different. A move is a transfer of
a piece or Pawn from the square on which it is standing, to another
square to which it is permitted to go.
The players take turns in making moves, with White always starting the
game. Two consecutive moves by the same player are prohibited. It is
imperative each player should take turn and no player can pass his turn
of move to the other player.
A player cannot move a piece or Pawn to a square occupied by one of his
own pieces or Pawns. The Knight is the only piece that can jump over a
square occupied by another piece or Pawn.

Touch & Move:

Before you start, remember one very important rule: if you touch one of
your pieces or Pawns, when it is your turn to move, you must move it. If
you touch one of your opponent’s men, you must capture it if you can.
And of course once you make a move, you cannot change it. Get into the
habit of playing Touch & Move Rule! First think out and calculate your
move carefully, and then play it firmly and without hesitation.
Many players, particularly those who are not very experienced, will
notice that something is wrong about a move after touching a piece or
making a move. Then the temptation to change the move is often hard
to resist. However, it is simply bad mannerism to change the move in the
process of making it or after making the move. Besides, changing the
move is against the rules of chess and it is illegal in Chess.
Capture
Capturing means taking the opponent’s man off the board and moving
your man onto the square the opponent’s man occupied. Note that
capturing is not compulsory in chess.
If an enemy man is on the square to which a move is made, it is captured
and removed from the board, and it cannot take part in the game
anymore. Thus, the number of men in a game of chess can only decrease
while the game is progressing. Two men cannot simultaneously occupy
the same square, and a player can never capture one of his own men.
The aim of the game is to checkmate the opponent’s King. The person
who succeeds in doing this first is the winner. If neither player succeeds
in winning, the game ends in a draw.
Here we end our first article on Placing the Board and setting the pieces.
Hope you learned how to set up the Board and Pieces. Next we will start
learning moves of various pieces and pawns. Please see my next article
on King and Pawns. Keep visiting these pages regularly and keep
updating your chess wisdom. If you need any specific help to learn chess,
please write back to me; I am always here to help you. Bye for now and
see you soon.