Usa Forum - GM opening advice vs computer analysis

jefkec2014

10/4/2014 1:52:00 PM

in my book, Better Chess Openings, with a first part
for beginners, and the rest for chess club level, i
mostly have focussed on main lines, comparable
with e.g. with the Quality Chess GM repertoire
series, but in a more condensed and for beginners,
much more simple manner. For beginners i sometimes
deviate from the main 'best' line, to simplify things.
Here is the book again
http://www.lulu.com/shop/jef-kaan/better-chess-openings/ebook/product-218...

In this book, for chess club level, i analyzed the moves
into detail, thus providing a rock- solid repertoire,
which can stand up to critical analysis, up to GM level.

Some examples where a GM writes an opening book, and I
have improved on it, thus giving better advice.
So besides the example i mentioned in an earlier
thread about the King's gambit (3...h6!) i will discuss
three examples, 1) the Dutch, and 2) the French (Winawer).

1) GM Moskalenko in his book 'The Diamond Dutch'
describes the Dutch defense (1.d4 f5!?) both
from a White and Black perspective. Yet i do not
recommend the Dutch for Black, because some months
ago i found some very strong lines with novelties
against the Dutch Leningrad defense (formerly considered
to be one of the strongest Dutch subvariations for Black.
The first moves are:
1. d4 f5 2. g3 Nf6 3. Bg2 g6 4. c4 Bg7 5. Nc3 O-O 6. Nf3 d6 7. O-O
Now 7...Qe8 is considered to be one of the main -and strong-
subvariations of the Dutch, see eg
http://nezhmet.wordpress.com/2008/06/17/the-fabulous-80s-and-beyond-dealing-with-the-lening...
However, White can play 8.Bf4! a move which
only has been played seldom, and not with such good
statistics when you look with Chessbase at the
played GM games. Well, the latter methode is
precisely why sometimes GM advice is not correct (yet).
Because i have analyzed the resulting play with
novelties in detail, i find advantage for White
in all significant subvariations after 8.Bf4,
and this shows up in a correspondence game on ICCF
which i am playing currently, and where i am winning
against the Dutch Leningrad in such a fashion (8.Bf4).
Therefore i now would prefer 7...c6 in the Leningrad.
However, also then i find advantage for White so
in fact in a good repertoire i would not advise
the Dutch for Black. And in my philosophy you
should play good moves, not speculative, moves
which can be refuted; that is gambling, not chess.
So what is my advise in my book for Black against 1.d4:
simply, the QGD, Queens gambit Declined, which i show
in simple version for beginners, and more detail,
and together with the Nimzo-Indian (if 3.Nc3) for
chess club level players. NB the Slav main lines also are
solid but sometimes imho more difficult to play for Black
so i will delay that until my book about openings for
chess-club to master level is ready (few years more)

2) in his book, the Wonderful Winawer, the same
GM, Moskalenko again, is discussing the Winawer
French, mostly from the Black perspective again.
However, similar problems occur again, because I
found a method for White to get -most likely- an
advantage even against the 'best' Winawer defense.
Here is the Winawer
1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. e5 Ne7 5. a3 Bxc3+ 6. bxc3 c5 7. Qg4
Now one of the strongest defense lines is
7...O-O! 8. Bd3 Nbc6 9. Nf3 f5
But then White can get advantage with
10. Qg5 !!
Again, not played so often, discussed by Moskalenko
but not recognized as the best move.
Play continues with e.g.
....b6 11. h4! h6 12. Qg3 Kh8 13. h5 Qc7 14. O-O Bd7
15. Qh4 Be8 16. a4 (Na5); White is not better yet
but i wouldn't bet on it in a correspondence game.
Also possible are 10...Qa5 or 10...c4 but
also then White gains an advantage.
A possible strategy is putting the White king
on h1, then a rook on g1, and subsequently
advancing the g4 pawn, g2g4!. Eventually
the Black king's position will come under
attack, whereby White can still hold his
own queen's position.

So, exit Winawer. Then maybe ...e5 or Sicilian
against 1.e4. Well indeed, in a quite long
and worked out chapter i describe 1...e5
for beginners, however, for more advanced
(Chess club level) players, i still give
French as additional repertoire, but then
with the Burn variation:
1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Bg5 dxe4 !
A very solid defense, especially if you know
how to play it, and ofcourse this is all
(together with other French Black lines)is
explained in my book. Why not Sicilian ?
Well first of all, only the Najdorf (with
some novelties) is solid enough i think
to (still?) withstand any White attack,
but also, the Sicilian is difficult to
play for Black, and thus is not advised,
except at higher levels, which (again)might
be the content of my next (chess) book.
Yes you will find some interesting attacks against
the Sicilian from the White perspective already in
my current book, eg how to find an advantage
against the Dragon.

Concluding, in this computer age where
Komodo8 and Stockfish easily crunch the
highest GM's, you also do not have to
be a GM to write about chess. True, it
was a lot of work, lasting yeras, and i
had to revise lots of content many times
before i was happy with the result(s).

But now there is a book which will withstand
the test of time, and contrary to a book
consisting of just some Chessbase games
annotated by a GM, i have composed the
content in such a meticulous way, that
it can withstand any GM criticism. And
due to it's timeless content (especiallly at
beginner's level), imho it should be worth to
become a 'classic' in the chess(book )world.

True, opening theory is not so important
at the lower/amateur levels of chess, but
then if such a player looks at the theory,
he/she might as well do that with a good
book, which i attempted to write, rather
than just some random - sometimes fashionable-
GM advice about systems such as 1...b6?!,
1...d6, 1...Nc6? and other stuff like that.
Of course, in my book i show the way how
to play against such systems (and in addition
systems such as the 'Sniper', the 'Black Lion'
and so forth) with White, which players will
appreciate in their rated games, and you will
see that, either when playing over the board
(having read my book and remembered it at
your level), or during the analysis afterwards.

best regards
& have fun

jef

PS (also for a certain Rainer), my ICCF
rating (Q4) now is 2165, up by some 25
points, so if i'm increasing 100/year, guess
what my rating becomes in seven years
(oh and btw my standard rating on Fics
is nog 1564 like Knsb Dutch, but >1700)

1 Answer

jefkec2014

10/13/2014 12:06:00 PM

ok, the term 'beginners' in the subscript of my book
was a bit misleading, what was meant is beginners in
opening theory, not complete beginners in chess.
But more like 'post'beginners,
or intermediate players.

As result i revised the subscript of my book into
'for intermediate levels of play' :

http://www.lulu.com/shop/jef-kaan/better-chess-openings/ebook/product-218...

Besides explanations, it contains two separate repertoires
for homeplayer/club player, and in addition some cool/sound
and computerchecked gambits (with White).

My next project might be BCO from club player to master,
but this will take some time. In the meantime my
goal is at least IM with ICCF correspondence play.

jef

rec.games.chess.computer

GM opening advice vs computer analysis

jefkec2014

jefkec2014

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