Opinions about this pawn defense (attack?!) by Black?

So a few weeks ago I asked about posting in here a chess opening/tactic that I haven’t seen much of before, and folks said go ahead as long as it wasn’t an active correspondence game. It wasn’t, but it was a position I had seen several times in the game history of an opponent. I decided not to post it until after I played him, and sure enough he played a similar opening again. I ended up winning the game, but Black’s opening caused me quite a lot of consternation in the beginning.

Here’s the position after four moves:

Any suggestions or thoughts about this type of defense by black?

Seems to me you might want to play 5.a4 in this position, and if 5…b4, then 6.Nd5.

By the way, why did you play 4.gNe2 rather than 4. Nf3?

And was black’s first move 1…e5 or 1…c5?

Bill Smythe

Bill, I believe my reasoning for the Knight move was that I wanted the ability to play Bg2 to cover the diagonal and defend the pawn on e4. Similarly I expected my queenside knight to move to d5 (and not live very long there) and wanted the ability to move the kingside knight into its old place to back up e4. This opponent plays this pawn formation a lot, and in looking at his past games, the center pawn area seemed to be the focus point and I wanted to bring weight to bear quickly. The fianchetto on the white diagonal ended up being key to getting through his pawn structure and winning the game.

This type of structure can occur from a Ruy, Sicilian, KID, Benoni. I’m curious what the first four moves were and whether a simple approach isn’t to transpose.

You asked for suggestions or thoughts. I’ll just try to shoot a few out without coming to a conclusion.

White has already developed two pieces to fine squares, and his king bishop will probably go to g2. He should probably castle kingside. Then he will have to find things to do. What he finds will depend on what Black has done by then, but there is always the pawn break f4 to think about. Or, if he moves his knight off of c3, he can think about advancing pawns to c3 and d4, and so on.

On the queenside, as Bill Smythe suggested, White can consider playing pawn to a4. At the moment, this more or less forces Black to reply b4. If White waited to play a4 later, it might not force b4, because Black might be able to just defend the b-pawn.

But what’s the point of all that? The point is that Black’s pawns on b5 and c5 control an annoying amount of space on the queenside. White can’t do anything interesting on that side. But after a4 forces b4, well, White pieces can get to c4, or White can advance a pawn to c3 to challenge the pawn on b4, and so on. It’s not the be-all and end-all, but it’s something you could try some time if that opponent likes this formation, just so you both can learn about how to handle that kind of position.

What about from Black’s point of view? What should he do with his pieces now that he has thrust out all those pawns? He really has a lot of choices. But with the pawns on a6 and b5 already, it would be natural for him to put his bishop on b7. Remember the discussion of White playing a4 and Black having to answer b4? If Black’s bishop were already on b7, then he would be ready to answer White’s a4 with just Qb6, defending the b-pawn.

What about pawn breaks for Black? He might have a hard time getting in … d5, and in addition, he might need that d-pawn to defend those far advanced pawns on e5 and c5. But you never know. And there’s also the possibility of …f5. But either of those pawn breaks is going to have to wait until Black has gotten enough pieces off the first rank to be ready.

Do I have a recommended line for White starting with the diagram? No. We’re still in the stage of the game where you are just developing your pieces and preparing for the real action. A recommended line now would be little more useful than a recommended line at move 1 (except that, if you want to play Bill Smythe’s a4 idea, the time to do it is now, as I have explained above).

Bruce

It was:

  1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 a6 3. Nge2 e5 4. g3 b5