There's only one way to really accelerate your game: read the books by old grandmasters.
Middle to end game?
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Instead of studying openings, study endgames.
Openings are very complex. The ideas and moves in opening theory have been developed by the best players over hundreds of years. Understanding this material is very difficult, it's just not the right place to start your study.
Instead, learn some basic endgames. This will pay off immediately. If you play the endgame right, you win! Compare that to what happens if you play the opening right, when all you get is a small advantage that you have to cultivate through the complicated middle game. Most new players -- in fact, even most players with years of experience -- make mistakes in the middle game that erase any advantage that was gained in the opening.
The other thing you want to study is Tactics. Even studying checkmate-in-1 problems will expose you to patterns of how to get your opponent in checkmate that you can apply to your own games. Studying mate-in-2 problems will help you see forcing variations, mate-in-3 (4,5,etc.) will help you calculate deeper. In addition to checkmate problems, you'll want to study tactics problems that involve winning material.
You might play endings like Smyslov, but if you cant survive through the opening and middlegame first, of what use is it ?
That's why no one suggests studying endgames to the point of complete mastery while utilizing the close your eyes and hope approach for the rest of the game as you seem to think they do.
Well, the endings are my achilles heel compared to the other two phases of chess but I spent the vast majority of my study time on middlegames and tactics with openings coming after that and endings least. Yes, it does show when I survive to an ending with an IM or GM only to be completely outplayed in the endings, this happens more often than not in fact. Except for the very basic endings I dont think players who arent reaching endings should be told to concentrate on endings. They need to reach them before they need to be able to play them well. In my case I should study endings more because I often reach them now with very strong players and am usualy outplayed, especially by GMs.
Hi there, while I'm not really new to chess (I have been playing since the 2nd grade) I have recently become more aware of its stratagey. I have been on youtube researching powerful openings posted by jrobichess and it has help me a lot in my beginning game. However once I get there I have a difficulty with closing the game and having an eye for how to get the oppenent in check. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to help me improve?