As this discussion is going to be a prayer without an end, I will limit myself to a few remarks:

"There are almost no games by strong players with the Nf3 idea, so it is hard to know what to make of it without doing a more careful study."

Strong Black players hardly ever play 8...Nxe4. In fact only Barejev and Smirin did. Both won, but not necessarily because of the opening.
At the other hand quite a few others played something else: Benkö, Miles, Savon, Barczay, Bischoff, Nisipeanu, D.Gurevitsj. Maybe there is a reason for it?
Anyhow, that bag of tricks was good enough for Van der Wiel to beat Hodgson in Brussel 1985. This imo is the most promising version of the Zaitsev Attack (or whatever).
Scholar, last word for you.

8.Nf3 Nxe4 9.Bf4 g6 10.Bd3 f5 11.Qe2 Bg7 12.o-o o-o 13.Ng5 looks quite interesting to me and 10.Bc4 Bg7 11.Qe2 f5 12.o-o o-o 13.Ng5 looks even better.
In practice 10.Qe2 has been played, but generally I do not like this move before the development of Bf1.
After 9...f5 10.Bc4 (10.Bd3 g6 see above) Nd7 (in stead of g6) 11.Nh4 White has very good compensation.
These lines could also result from line a in a previous post of mine.
I maintain two points: with 8...Nxe4 Black takes an irresponsible risk and 8.Nf3 is more precise than 8.Bf4 (because of g5 immediately).

Fair enough. Remarkable though, that Black has done so bad after 8.Bf4 Nxe4 9.Bd3 g5.
Still line b) remains. Haven't you noticed the transposition 8.Bf4 Nxe4 9.Nf3 / 8.Nf3 Nxe4 9.Bf4 ?

8...Nxe4 comes close to suicide, unregarding White plays 8.Nf3, 8.Bc4 or 8.Bf4:
a) 8.Nf3 Nxe4 9.Bc4 Nd7 (g6 10.Qe2 Nf6 11.Bf4 Ra6 12.Nxd6+ Rxd6 13.Bb5+ wins the exchange) 10.Qe2 Ndf6 11.Bf4 Bg4 12.Qe3 "and Black is in trouble because of the threats 13.Nd2 and 13.Ng5" (Schwarz).
b) 8.Nf3 Nxe4 9.Bf4 Ra5 (Bb7 10.Bc4 g5! so 10.Qe2 Bxd5 11.Nd2) 10.Bc4 Qb6 11.Qe2 Ba6 12.Qxe4 Bxb5 13.Bxb5 Rxb5 14.Nd2 +-Samojlov-Sjsjepetkin, Riazan 1975 (Taimanov).
c) 8.Bc4 Nxe4 9.Qe2 f5 (Nf6 10.Bf4 Ra6 11.Nf3 or 11.Nxd6+ ) 10.f3 Nf6 11.Bf4 Ra6 12.Nh3 g6 13.o-o Bg7 14.Rfe1 h6 15.Rad1 and the White initiative compensates more than enough for the pawn (Taimanov), Sjuravlev-Grusjko, Kaliningrad 1976.
d) 8.Bf4 Nxe4 9.Bd3 Nf6 10.Qe2 Ra6 11.Nxd6+ Rxd6 12.Bb5+ again wins the exchange.
You might also take a look at Bosboom-Georgiev, Lost Boys Open 1997. Notice the ELO-difference.

Toppy –

You said 8.Bf4 and I played 8…Nxe4, and your only response was “are you serious about this?”  Then, you went silent.  It sounds to me like you are in shock after you realized that you had just lost a pawn for nothing.   

And what’s this about increasing post count?  Coming from you, that is hilarious.    I’m sure that many of us remember your one-word “Albatross!” posts a few months ago that helped inflate your post counts so that you qualified for “god” status.  I’m glad you finally got over that albatross fixation, which seemed to go on forever.   

- Lost Highway

@Top: What was your entry for? increase the count?  ??? 

Indeed the c3 move is cited also in the Mc Donald book. As I said, my problem is with the revealed series.... find it difficult to navigate and find a specific line.

The Mc Donald book I am finding better each time, I just happen to disagree of the inclusion of Nimzowitch-Capablanca. The game is controversial to start with (many claiming it WAS an oversight, and it is the Spanish!).

Ok, I know openings overlap, but to use a CONTROVERSIAL game of a DIFFERENT opening to EXPLAIN the Benko, well...

Well that was ez

Problem solved.

Toppy

London Chess Centre...

I was not using programs to analyse or giving much credit to their evaluations, it just looked to me that way.... (about the 'Blumenfeld' type variation)