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This month's update will cover the trendy 5.h3 and 6.Be3 system, which has been causing Black some trouble since Fabiano Caruana's adoption caused a veritable stampede of followers. Black's job is certainly not easy, though he does have several ways of trying to combat it. I will break these down into three major sections, the traditional ...e5 plan, the provocative 6...Nc6 and an attempt to transpose into a kind of enhanced Maroczy Bind with 6...c5.

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King's Indian Makaganov with 5.h3 and 6.Be3, Black plays 6...Nbd7 and 7...e5 [E90]

The first port of call against any King's Indian plan must surely be to play for ...e7-e5. After 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.h3 0-0 6.Be3 Black probably does best to stay flexible with 6...Nbd7, the immediate 6...e5 being met by 7.d5 and then 8.g4. White would not want to play 7.g4 after 6...Nbd7 because Black would look for queenside action with 7...c5 or even 7...a6. So normally White meets 6...Nbd7 with the flexible 7.Nf3 after which 7...e5 8.d5 Nc5 9.Nd2 reaches a critical position:

It's not at all clear that Black needs to play 9...a5, he did so in Gorshtein, I - Tejaswini, G and Neimann, H - Amin, B but avoided it in Xu, X - Vakhidov J.


Petrosian/Makaganov 6.Be3 Nbd7 7.Be2 e5 8.d5 Nc5 9.Qc2 a5 10.Nf3 [E93]

What I found interesting was that Xu avoided then playing 10.b4, and I wondered whether Naranyan's 7.Be2 and 9.Qc2:

(Naranyan, S - Bologan, V) was designed to play 10.b4, should Black dispense with the prophylactic 9...a5. In any case this treatment does not seem to fully solve Black's problems.

Makagonov System 5.h3 0-0 6.Be3 The provocative 6...Nc6 7.d5 Ne5 [E71]

The plan with 6...Nc6 is far riskier for Black, not least because it allows White to grab a lot of space with 7.d5 Ne5 8.f4. After 8...Ned7 there have been previous updates covering 9.g4, but the trendy move is 9.Nge2:

This allows White to meet 9...c6 with 10.Ng3, which was very good for White in Praggnanandhaa, R - Rapport, R before he made some kind of horrific miscalculation late in the game.

White can also meet 9...c6 with 10.g4, which is what happened in Robson, R - Firouzja, A, and Black's apparent theoretical novelty with 16...e6 did not help his cause in the least.

Magsoodloo's 8.Qc2:

(Magsoodloo, P - Theodorou, N) can transpose into the line 8.f4 Ned7 9.g4 e6 10.dxe6 fxe6 11.Qc2, but after 8....c6 he can play 9.f4 Ned7 10.Nf3. This looks like a neat wrinkle, not committing himself to g2-g4 in all cases. Once again White seems to emerge with a nice space advantage, though the position is still dangerous for him because pawns cannot move backwards.


Makagonov System with 5.h3 and 6.Be3, Maroczy Attempts with 6...c5 [E90]

The last Black attempt we'll look at is the attempt to reach an improved Maroczy Bind with 6...c5 7.Nf3 and now 7...Qa5. The 8.Bd3:

of Yu, Y - Sindarov, J looks like an effective solution, and White was clearly better until he somehow miscalculated towards the end of the game. I don't see 6...c5 as a way to get anything but a Maroczy Bind, with the usual edge for White.

The 5.h3 and 6.Be3 line is a live battleground, and a good antidote has yet to be found. There are several ways to create a murky position, which is typical for the King’s Indian in the modern era.


See you next month! Nigel

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Don't hesitate to share your thoughts and suggestions. Any queries or comments to the KID Forum, or to me directly at support@chesspublishing.com (subscribers only) would be welcome.