Hi, welcome to my study on the Ruy Lopez (Spanish) opening in chess. This study should give you a good understanding of this very deep-ocean opening. It is one of the oldest openings analyzed in chess history. This opening is played by all sorts of chess players ranging from top grandmasters to everyday amateurs. It's a very exciting opening to play as both white and black, with many options!1e4...The most logical opening move, putting a pawn in the center and trying to develop the kingside.
Here black has two main moves, and both of them aim to stop white from conquering the center even more. c5 is more complex, so I prefer something calmer, that is e5.1...e5Black puts their pawn in the center2Nf3...White develops a piece where it looks at two center squares.2...Nc6Black does the same thing with its knight, develops it so that it looks at the center squares. This knight also defends the e5 pawn which was attacked by the white knight last move.
Now white has a few popular continuations shown by the blue arrows, and all of them have to with either developing a piece to a good square and/or putting a piece in the center.3Bb5...And white plays the Ruy Lopez opening. This is going to be quite a positional and interesting game.
In this chapter I'm just going to show you the pure basic ideas from this point, and in the following chapters we'll go into more depth on the specific variations available.3...a6The most common and logical move, just nudging the bishop once4Ba4...The bishop drops back. You can see why white does not win the e5 pawn after Bxc6.4.Bxc6This is, in fact, NOT winning the e5 pawndxc65.Nxe5Qd4Because black wins the e4 pawn back straight away, and white hasn't gained any advantage in the process.6.Nf3Qxe4+7.Qe2Qxe2+8.Kxe2Bf59.d3O-O-O4...Nf6Black develops another piece, just floating the idea of b5 for a little longer5O-O...White gets their king safe5...Be7Black develops another piece, these are all very good, productive moves6Re1...White develops the rook, defends the pawn and puts the rook on the center file. It is best for black to play b5 at this point.6...b57Bb3O-OBlack gets their king safe.8c3...A multi-purpose move. This is trying to support the central break d2-d4, or just the center in general, and also gives the light squared bishop a tuck-away square on c2.
Here black can play simply with d6, or more aggressively with d5. Both are sensible because they fight for the center and aim to develop the rest of black's army, and both lead to a good game for both sides.8...d6For example d6, keeping the game fairly closed
The Ruy Lopez is a slow, positional, maneuvering game. White has some ideas, he can play d3 or d4, h3, and maneuver this knight Nb1-d2-f1 and then jump to either the e3 or g3 squares. Black's plan is to try and create a central break or a queenside attack by moving his knight and using his c-pawn. It is a very good and interesting game for both sides.