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Normal Topic English as my main white opening? (Read 3926 times)
MarkPharaoh
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Re: English as my main white opening?
Reply #5 - 08/23/04 at 21:44:22
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If you don't want to study a ton of Theory play 1. g3 for White and plays Owen's Defense as Black against e4 and ...d5 against 1. d4.
  
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Bucaresti
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Re: English as my main white opening?
Reply #4 - 07/28/04 at 15:47:31
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Scott should buy Tony Kosten's excellent 'Dynamic English' book!
  
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Re: English as my main white opening?
Reply #3 - 07/28/04 at 08:51:35
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If White wants to play the English without transposing to the Queen's Gambit, he must watch out for 1.c4 e6 2.Nc3 d5 and there is nothing better but 3.d4.
So 1.c4 e6 2.Nf3 d5 3.g3 is the only independent option, transposing to a line of the Reti.
About the same problem arises after 1.c4 c6 intending 2...d5 though White has a few more options.
One warning: as an amateur it is a bad idea to change repertoire every three months. So make your choice for the first move and stick to it for a couple of years.
  

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Re: English as my main white opening?
Reply #2 - 07/27/04 at 20:16:32
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To be quite frank, 1 c4 requires as much preparation as e4 or d4. 

The only way to avoid serious preparation is to avoid main systems altogether (or play completely on ideas - which won't always turn out well because of tactics).  The English is still considered a mainstream opening, not quite as common as either d4 or e4 but still played often enough.

If you truly want to learn a system but not have to learn the reams of information on it, choose a system like 1 b3, 1 f4, 1 g3, 1 b4, or a gambit repertoire (preferably not common ones like Smith-Morra e4 c5 d4 cxd4 c3, which hardly shocks opponents). 

If you are completely serious about learning the English, go for it.  There are plenty of subsystems to play around with, but be warned that even the English requires its fair share of preparation (particularly 1 c4 e5). 

NeX iRae
  
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AmateurDragoneer
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Re: English as my main white opening?
Reply #1 - 07/27/04 at 18:10:57
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Since there is a 1. d4 d5 forum also, most of the people in this forum either use the English without planning to transpose to 1. d4 openings or as a way to avoid certain 1. d4 openings.

Also, while I would certainly encourage you to use 1. c4 as your main opening, don't go on statistics and GM usage alone. You should play openings YOU like.

Also, if you don't want to spend too much time studying openings, it doesn't make sense to learn a main opening and a second weapon. If you like the english, it's probably easier to learn than the QG and if you want to play the QG you'll probably also have to learn theory for other 1. d4 openings (QID, KID, Nimzo, etc.).
  
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Scott Rex
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English as my main white opening?
07/27/04 at 17:34:02
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Hello everyone,

I'm so excited to have found this site, as I'm somewhat new to chess and your comments have helped me immensely in choosing my opening repertoire.  Up to this point, I have focuses primarily on my black repertoire, and have played the queen's gambit as white for no other reason than it was one of the first that I learned and I like the positions better than 1. e4. 

However, recently I have begun to consider the English opening as I begin to take my chess preparation seriously and enter tournaments for the first time.  The statistics for the English look good, and I know it is played fairly frequently at the top levels.  It seems like a reasonable compromise for someone like me who wants a respectable opening with examples from grandmaster games but doesn't have the time to spend hours every night looking through reams of the latest analysis.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not looking for an easy way out or an all-in-one solution, but the reality of having a full time job has to factor into opening preparation (and chess preparation in general) at some point Smiley

Anyway, are there any of you who use the English as your main opening without the intention of transposing to main d4 openings?  Or would you recommend that I go with the queen's gambit as my main opening and learn the English later as a second weapon?  It just seems like such an overwhelming task to choose an opening and spend a year or two studying and playing it only to discover that it isn't what you had hoped - I want to make sure I have considered various points of view before diving in. 

Thanks for any thoughts,
Scott Rex
  
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