“The hardest thing is to win a won game.”
— Frank Marshall
This is a popular quote in chess, and some internet sources also attribute it to Emanuel Lasker, who must have made a similar observation. It is not strictly true, of course. It is much easier to win if you have an objective advantage, either material or positional. But the point is that when you realize that you have a decisive advantage, it is easy to fall into a false sense of security and become complacent.
This is where it becomes very interesting from your opponent’s standpoint. It is useful to know about this tendency if it is your opponent who has an a superior position, and you are forced to defend. It becomes your advantage that can be exploited. If you have a losing position, it will lead to the actual loss of the game only provided that the opponent plays correctly. In practice, it is worth to put up resistance as long as possible in order to give him or her ample chances to make mistakes. The more difficult decisions the opponent is forced to make, the higher the chances of them getting something wrong.
The reigning world champion Magnus Carlsen is known for being exceptionally skilled in defending and turning around inferior positions. Of course, he is also exceptionally skilled in other aspects of the game, so he doesn’t get into inferior positions that often. But it does happen even at his level, which is what makes chess so fascinating. I remember reading (but cannot find the source) that Magnus mentioned distributing his effort of mental concentration in inverse proportion to the winning chances of the position. If he thinks that he has only 1% chance of winning, he would put 99% of energy into finding a way of doing so. Whether this is factually true or not, it is certainly an admirable goal to aspire to. It is also an illustration of warrior’s spirit, a concept that permeates chess as much as it does a martial art like kendo, which I find quite remarkable.
