Amin Kabilov FM

Positive Highlights

Amin, your recent blitz games show encouraging progress and solid strengths to leverage moving forward:

• Your recent rating improvement is notable, with a steady upward trend reflected in a 39-point gain in the last month and consistent progress over 6 to 12 months. Keep focusing on this trajectory!
• You have a strong performance in openings like the Amazon Attack: Siberian Attack with a 100% win rate, and solid results in the Dőry Defense and Closed Sicilian Defense variations (over 66% wins).
• Your strength adjusted win rate of about 62% showcases your ability to convert chances even against opponents of similar or higher ratings.
• You've demonstrated resilience in complex middlegames and endgames, as seen in your wins by resignation and on time pressure, reflecting practical time management and decision-making skills.

Areas to Improve

There are some key areas that offer great potential for further improvement:

• Opening Consistency: Your Philidor Defense and Sicilian Defense results show room for improvement, with roughly a 33% win rate. Consider deepening your understanding and preparation in these lines to reduce early inaccuracies or traps.
• Tactical Awareness: Some losses stem from tactical oversights or material loss, especially in openings and early middlegame. Training tactics puzzles and reviewing critical moments from your recent losses can help sharpen this.
• Handling Pressure Positions: In some games, the transition from equality or slight advantage to a lost position suggests improving your handling of defense and counterattacks under pressure.
• Time Management: Although you often win on time, improving your speed without sacrificing accuracy will help in fast time controls and avoid last-minute mistakes.
• Expand Draw and Endgame Skills: With only one draw in your recent games, working on endgame technique to salvage or push for draws can boost your overall resilience in tough games.

Focus Points for Your Training

• Study and reinforce your weaker openings, specifically the Philidor Defense and mainline Sicilian, through video lessons or opening databases.
• Regular tactical training focusing on pattern recognition, forks, pins, discovered attacks, and defending critical squares.
• Analyze your losses with engine assistance and identify moments where alternatives were better — focus especially on early deviations and tactical blunders.
• Practice quick calculation exercises and play occasional shorter time controls to improve intuition and decision-making speed.
• Invest time into basic and intermediate endgame theory, especially rook endgames and pawn endgames that often arise from your openings.
• Review critical moments in your successful games to reinforce good habits and capitalise on your strengths.

General Advice

Keeping a balanced study approach focusing on opening preparation, middlegame tactics, and endgame technique will yield continued rating improvements and tournament wins. Consider playing slower time controls occasionally to deepen calculation depth and reduce tactical errors. Finally, reviewing your games with a coach or strong player can accelerate improvement by pinpointing subtle mistakes and guiding focus.