Once we have chosen the right formation in the centre we have created opportunities for our pieces and laid the foundation of subsequent victory.

In choosing an opening plan players think most of all of harmonious development for the pieces, but sometimes leave the development of the queen out of their considerations. Yet the Queen is the most valuable and important piece and the whole outcome can depend upon how successfully she plays her role.

Experience and the constant analysis of the most varied positions builds up a store of knowledge in a player's mind enabling him often at a glance to assess this or that position.

All candidate moves should be identified at once and listed in one's head. This job cannot be done piecemeal, by first examining one move and then look at another.

When you have finished analyzing all the variations and gone along all the branches of the tree of analysis you must first of all write the move down on your score sheet, before you play it.

If your opponent is short (on time), play just as you played earlier in the game. If you are short keep calm, I repeat, don't get flustered. Keep up the same neat writing of the moves, the same methodical examination of variations, but at a quicker rate.

If a chess statistician were to try and satisfy his curiousity over which stage of the game proved decisive in the majority of cases, he would certainly come to the conclusion that it is the middlegame that provides the most decisive stage.