How to Protect Your King in a Chess Game

Video Transcript

"King safety. Since the game is over when the king is captured, it's obviously important to make sure at all time that your king is in a safe of a position as possible. And one way of doing this is by castling. Castling does get your king off the center square, it does get it in a safer position out of the way in the corner where it is more difficult for an opponent to attack. And I've shown here what is a very good position with the pawns to defend your king which is simply the three pawns in front of it being in their original positions. That is a good strong position and it is not easy to attack the king like that. This is also playable and is sometimes used but its probably not quite as good as this position. Now the position is further enhanced if you have a knight on this bishop's three square. That will give further strength to your position notice that the knight is defending the pawn here. Now an even stronger way of building a defense in front of the king, is by having a bishop on the knight's two square. Now that position as it now stands is an extremely difficult position for an opponent to attack your king."