I don’t know the 1990 book by Speelman which parisestmagique mentions and don’t understand the reference since both Polgar--Seirawan and Gurevich--Speelman were played in 1993, but Speelman annotates the latter game (and cites the former) in his 2000 Modern Defence book co-authored with McDonald. There he writes (p. 136) that his 26 …Kf6? was a mistake, and that after 26 …Nf6! 27 Bd3 Rg8! 28 g3 f4! Black would have been fine. (NB. He gives ...Kf6? as m. 26 rather than 28 as he omits the repetitions given above for mm. 18--19.)

Overall though, I can only agree with Keano about this variation. Hansen’s 19 Qe2, keeping the Queens on, looks an effective way of showing up the weaknesses of Black’s position. White might have to take a bit of care in regrouping, but c4--c5 is coming in very soon (maybe after Kb1) and it's hard to see what Black has to offset White’s two Bishops, better structure and much better King safety.

It can be found in "the Modern defense" by Speelman 1990. He gives a few games and says that f5 is probably better than h6. One of the games is beautifoul Polgar-Seirawan Blind Monaco 1993 :
1.d4 d6 2.Nf3 g6 3.c4 Bg7 4.Nc3 e5 5.e4 exd 6.Nxd4 Nc6 7.Be3 Nge7 8.h4 f5 9.h5 fxe4 10.hxg hxg 11.Rxh8+ BxR 12.Ne4 Bf5 13.Ng3 Nxd4 14.Bxd4 Kd7 15.Be2 Nc6 16.Be3 Bxb2 17.Rb1 Bc3+ 18.Kf1 Qh4 19.Rxb7 Rh8 20.Bf3 and here instead of Qxc4+ he suggest a slight improvement for Black, can you see it ?

maybe f5 (! Speelman) is better than h6 ... After 1.d4 g6 2.c4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.e4 e5 5.Nf3 exd4 6.Nxd4 Nc6 7.Be3 Nge7 8.h4 f5 !?

1/ yes i can confirm you "Kind of a denial, use a bit of objectivity" is agressiv 2/Objectivity is how a program stronger than 99,9% of the players judge this position very slightly better for white 3/ The subject was to check the supposed white plus in the Modern given in the theorical books (the endgame) your Nf3 is another way but cannot be a refutation of the e5 line because Black can transpose in a KID by Nd7 or exd4 with Nf6] 4/ If you want to continue this endgame with 3 pieces each no problem but maybe by e-mail ?! 

Keano wrote on 10/13/06 at 18:51:25:


I dont mean to be agressive trust me, if that is the impression I give sorry  

Now, firstly lets establish what has happened - we played a few moves out of the opening and on move 15 you allowed this endgame to happen - so naturally the assessment of the ending is critical for your whole opening concept - there are many examples of this - Berlin Lopez etc. where the endgame is still theoretical. In this case I dont think you can say, which is what I think you are trying to (forgive me if I get the wrong impression) "The opening is over now because the queens have been swapped, I have no danger" Forgive me if I misinterpret you, but that is the impression you give to me. After your 18...Bd7 I have a choice between rook to d1, or e1, or Nd5 - if you want to continue the analysis I will think about it - all moves look good. What I would recommend you to do is think about your position in more general terms - all of your pawns are weak, Whites pawns are not - and to think if you could defend this position in a tournament, or if you would even want it. My analysis would stop here with "This is not an acceptable position for Black" If you are happy with it by all means continue with this system, I am just trying to help - your queston at the beginning was something like "I see nothing wrong with this for Black, all lines are OK", I played a few moves as you suggested to show that all lines are not OK, and now you seem to be taking it personally - I am just trying to help! 

As for the Kasparov game being old stuff, I believe this is a correct assesment - modern GM practice prefers Qd2 and it does seem more effective. Remember that whatever books you have were written at a particular point in time, at that time the Kasparov - Speelman game would have been cutting edge, not anymore.[1/ Yes i can confirm you "kind of a denial, use a bit of objectivity" is agressiv. 2/Objectivity is how a program stronger than 99,9% of the players judge this position slightly better for white 3/ The subject was to check the supposed white plus in the Modern given in the theorical books (the endgame) your Nf3 is another way but cannot be a refutation of the e5 line because Black can transpose in a KID by Nd7 or exd4 with Nf6] 4/ If you want to continue this endgame with 3 pieces each no problem but maybe by e-mail ?!

Thanks once again, Ametanoitos! -- these ideas are most inspiring and I shall take a good look at them. It's great to encounter so much near-virgin territory! Defo going to get the book as well!

[quote]SOS 4: An Indian SOS, part I (Rogazenko) 4..Nd7 5.Nf3 (other moves are also covered in detail) e5 6.Be2 c6 7.O-O (i give only the main line given in every book about the modern) Nh6! (my exclam) 8.c5 (the absolute test!) dxc5 9.dxe5 and now every book (including Grivas') give only 9..O-O with white having an advantage (Rogozenko also gives analysis to claim equality for black here!) but "Rogo" concentrates on the rare move 9..Qc7 which gives excellent play. [/quote]


Extremely interesting, Ametanoitos -- thank you! In the critical 8 c5 dc 9 de line I hadn’t noticed 9 ...Qc7! (10 Qd6 Qd6 11 ed 0-0) before (played by Gaprindashvili against Keene in 1978 and seemingly since forgotten), but once you see this it makes a lot of sense. Compared with Stohl’s perhaps rather optimistic [i]Informator 58[/i] suggestion of 8 …ed 9 Bh6 Bh6 10 Qd4 0-0 11 cd Qb6 12 Qb6 ab 13 Rfd1 Bg7 Black doesn’t have the two Bishops and consequent dark-square grip, but then he does have a healthy pawn more than in that line!

Obviously I must acquire the SOS book, but meanwhile I wonder how Black should counter some of White’s other tries for advantage. In the 5 Nf3 e5 6 Be2 c6 7 0-0 Nh6 line, how for instance should he meet 8 d5 with standard queenside play -- is the right plan to swap off the dark-square Bishops, as in Rogozenko--Badea and McDonald--Pritchett? And what’s the best way to meet 7 d5!? (7 …c5 8 g4!?)?

The fifth-move alternatives look less critical, but still interesting. On 5 Nge2 I guess Black can transpose to a perfectly decent E89 Saemisch with 5 …e5 6 Be3 Ngf6 7 f3 0-0 8 Qd2 c6 or 8 d5 Nh5, but can he instead stay within Modern/Averbakh territory? -- 6 …Nh6 7 f3 f5 8 Qd2 Nf7 9 0-0-0 0-0 10 ef gf 11 f4 looks +/=, but maybe 7 …f6 is possible, or else 6 …Ne7!? or 6 …c6!? -- ? Does Rogozenko have any thoughts here?

Keano raises a very interesting point about 5 f4 e5 6 fe de 7 d5 Ngf6! leading to a King’s Indian. The issue here seems to be that in terms of how Informator classification works it takes fewer moves for an E76 position to be reached than for the main(?) line of this Anti-Averbakh variation (8 Nf3 0-0 9 Bd3) to occur. Thus 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 g6 3 Nc3 Bg7 4 e4 d6 5 f4 0-0 6 Nf3 e5!? is E76 -- reaching, after 7 fe fe 8 d5 Nbd7 9 Bd3, a position that Informator would classify as A42 if it occurred via the 4 …Nd7 move order. The main-line position (or more accurately, one line of it) can be reached in at least three other ways via E76. Of these, two -- 5 f4 0-0 6 Nf3 Nbd7 7 Bd3 e5 8 fe fe 9 d5, and 5 f4 e5 6 fe fe 7 d5 Nbd7 8 Nf3 0-0 9 Bd3 – appear not to be recommendable, because of, respectively, 7 e5! and 6 de! de 7 Qd8. The third is 5 f4 0-0 6 Nf3 Na6 7 Bd3 e5!? (7 …Bg4!) 8 fe de 9 Bd3, whereon 9 …Nc5 (unmentioned on ChessPub, which gives only 9 …c6 10 0-0 cd 11 cd Ne8 12 Bg5! +/=) is the A42 line with 9 Bd3 Nc5. Indeed, 9 …Nc5 (10 Bc2 a5 or 10 …Nh5) seems to be one of Black’s main options here, but there are several others: 9 … c6 (10 0-0 h6 -- first played by Paulsen!), 9 …Nh5, 9 …Qe7, 9 …a5 (10 0-0 Nh5) and 9 …h6 (10 0-0 a5). Does Rogozenko endorse any of these over the others?

Finally, the same position has in fact also been reached via E70 (5 Bd3 Nbd7 6 f4 e5 7 fe de 8 d5 0-0 9 Nf3), and no doubt in other ways too. Fascinating subject, transposition!

There will be some fresh (and I'm sure very thorough) analysis on ...Kth6 stuff in the d4+c4 Modern in "Carpathian Warrior II."