Download PGN of July '06 1 d4 d5 games

Open Catalan [E04-05]

Perhaps ironically it was Garry Kasparov himself who pointed out some of the key ideas for White in his matches against Anatoly Karpov. Now his one time protégé, Vladimir Kramnik, is staging his comeback to the world's elite using this very same opening.

The Catalan sets Black positional problems, rather than tactical ones, and in the hands of Vladimir Kramnik is a frightening opening to defend against. In many games Black is condemned to a passive defence where with best play he can only hope for a draw. That is why, in this update, I am recommending variations with 4...dxc4 for Black that aim to complicate right from the word go. As a very general rule then, it is sensible for Black to aim to 'mess things up' and surprisingly often to avoid the exchange of queens!

This update covers the state of the Catalan theory for the last three months and most critical variations are covered. Note that, as I demonstrate in the notes to the games, objectively Black had methods to equalise/counterchances in all of these games, and yet White achieved plus 5! To my mind this sort of statistic is an encouragement to try this opening!

The Sharp Variations

A classical Catalan variation occurs after 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Nf3 dxc4 5.Bg2 c5!? 6.O-O Nc6 and now 7.Ne5 Bd7. Here White normally plays 8.Na3 but fully playable is the immediate 8.Nxc4. Now after the interesting sequence 8...cxd4 9.Bf4 Be7 10.Nd6+ Kf8 11.Nxb7 Qb6 12.Nd6 Qc5 13.Ne4 Nxe4 14.Bxe4 g5:

and here believe it or not, 15.Bc1! is a novelty, as was seen in Loginov - Anisimov. Black responded excellently, however, and after Loginov missed a good chance on the 23rd move he was subjected to a heavy attack and eventually lost.

In Kramnik - Naiditsch the players reached, through a different move order, a rather rare position after 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Nf3 dxc4 5.Bg2 c5!? 6.O-O and now instead of the main line with, 6...Nc6, simply 6...cxd4!?. Black has to be very careful here and after 7.Nxd4:

The novelty 7...Nd5?! left Naidistch lost right from the opening. The interesting 7...Qb6 is my recommendation here as can be seen in the notes.

Naiditsch was much better prepared in his next match against Vladimir, Game 3. After 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Nf3 dxc4 5.Bg2 Nc6! 6.Qa4 Nd7 7.Qxc4 Nb6 8.Qb5!? Bd7 9.Qb3 Na5 Kramnik employed the new idea 10.Qd3 but Naiditsch had clearly analysed this before hand and uncorked a spectacular piece sacrifice 10...c5! 11.dxc5 Bxc5 12.Qc3 Rc8:

after which the players plunged headfirst into massive complications!

Curiously the same opening was played, in the same event, in the same round, in Leko - Adams! There Adams preferred the more heavily analysed 6...Bb4+ 7.Bd2 Nd5 and after 8.Bxb4 Ndxb4 9.a3 b5!. Again, heavy complications ensued after White sacrificed a piece for three pieces. However, Adams showed with accurate play that Black had fully sufficient counterplay.

The Positional Variations

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Nf3 Be7 5.Bg2 O-O 6.O-O dxc4 7.Qc2 a6 8.Qxc4 (8.a4 is examined next month) 8...b5 9.Qc2 Bb7 and here 10.Bd2! makes life a little difficult for Black although he can equalise with precise play. In Beliavski - Lautier Black adopted a well known plan with 10...Nbd7 11.Ba5 Rc8:

Black plans 12...Nb8 followed by ...Nc6 but Beliavsky played an interesting novelty in the early middlegame and won convincingly after Lautier failed to react correctly.

After 10.Bd2! Black instead tried 10...Ra7 in Avrukh - Sandipan. The idea is to bring the queen to a8. White again won a nice game, but for some reason Sandipan did not play Leko's novelty in this line, which appears to equalise - see the notes to this game for more detail.

Instead of 10.Bd2, 10.Bf4 is sometimes seen and now in Bruzon - Anand the Indian chess genius showed that simplest for Black is 10...Nc6! 11.Rd1 Nb4 12.Qc1 Rc8:

and after some further accurate moves Anand even took over the initiative.

8.a4!? is a critical line, and we will look at this, as well, next month.

John-Paul

If you have any questions, then please post a message at the 1 d4 d5 Forum, or subscribers can email me at ruslan@chesspublishing.com.