By the way, van Kampen in his video series on Taimanov suggests black to play after 6.Be2 Nf6 7.0-0 Be7, and avoid -a6 altogether. 

However, white can play play first 6.Be3 a6 (6.-Nf6?! 7.f4!) and now 7.Be2 and 8.0-0. This avoids this 'clever' idea completely.Van Kampen actually says that Scheveningen with -a6  is quite dangerous for black while theoretically ok. 

Can black benefit from the Be3+Be2 move order? The only possibility is 7.-b5. Is this good enough for equality?

I personally don't like the classical  main line of Taimanov for black and currently prefer the Scheveningen approach.

Lauri Torni wrote on 03/27/18 at 09:46:28:


Maybee black is equal. The reason I play g3 is that I played it since about 2002 an not becouse of any theoretical advantage but thats a different story for some other thread.

Many Taimanov lines are as sharp as Dragon but blacks position is a lot sounder so I played it for several years.
However there was one line I never liked to play against and it was g3, a line I actually play with white.
"The most flexiible sicilian" covered both a mainline with an ealy Bd7 and an unexplored aggresive option with an early h5.
However h5 deseved a double ?? mark, if white finds an improvment covered in "the Taimanov bible" blacks position is cleary worse.
I also had some bad luck that Be3 Qf3 system became the new mainline some years after that the book was realised so in short term I currently plays French since it can also rule out several d-paws specials and still alllow Nimzo but I will likely switch back to Taimanov in a near future when I get more time to study openings and find something to play vs Be3 Qf3 system.

Note from moderatior MNb: for the time being I keep this comment here, but if there will be follow ups about the Taimanov and/or French I will transfer the subthread.