July 2004
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IM Andy Martin |
Greetings from England and welcome to the July Update!To download the July '04 1 e4 ... games directly in PGN form, click here: 
For your general edification and delight:
Scandinavian Defence
The Scandinavian proves a tough nut to crack in our opening game. Zhukova plays in my opinion the most precise Black move-order: 1 e4 d5 2 exd5 Qxd5 3 Nc3 Qa5 4 d4 c6! 5 Nf3 Bf5! 6 Bc4 e6
            
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and White fails to make an impact, see Game one.
Alekhine's Defence
We move to the Alekhine for Navara - Miroshichenko and more precisely the super-sharp line 5...Nd7 6 Nxf7!?:
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, still as controversial as ever. I like 8 g3! for White and the annotations explain why.
Pirc/Modern Defence
In Taleb - Pavlov White plays a quite line against the Pirc. He should get nothing but then comes 12 Bxf4! and 14 e5!
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This is a very interesting moment in the game.
Lodhi - Rahman is an old-fashioned Austrian Attack, spiced up with 6 e5!? Ne8!?:
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Black wins but I'm really not sure.
Caro-Kann
Put on your wide-angled glasses for Sebag - Chiburdanidze where Black treats us to the novelty 4...a5!?:
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Sebag cannot hack her way through this one as you will see.
Morozevitch - Bologan is a fantasy Caro with a brilliant finish. In the euphoria it must not be forgotten that Black was fine in this game and the key moment was Black's 23...e3?. Instead 23...Ndf5!
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more than keeps him on the board. There were other opportunities too!
Dolzhilova - Gutsko is by no means a great game but Black falls in to a cute trap . The exchange Caro is played a lot by people who want an easy life in the opening; it doesn't take enormous imagination to shunt the pieces to good squares e.g. 15 Rae1:
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But Black cannot be careless, as you will see.
Finally Lyell - Arkell, a brilliancy prize winner from the recent Coventry International. Arkell plays his favourite discredited line in the Panov (5...g6) but if 9...Nc7
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is the best that Black has then I cannot recommend that one follows this particular Grandmaster example.
That's it for now. See you in August !
Andrew
Please post you queries on the 1 e4 ... Forum, or subscribers can write to me at AMartin@ChessPublishing.com if you have any questions or queries.