I think a lot of lower rated players think white is winning after 2.e4, because black has "given up the centre". Even on this forum, some quite high rated people did not like 1.Nf3 d5 2. c4 pxp for similar reason, which I was quite suprised about...

J-dog wrote on 10/11/06 at 20:50:58:


The QGA is actually a pretty good defence for black at all levels and strikes a nice balance between complexity and solidity, but for some reason its quite under-rated at amateur level. Perhaps its not considered sexy enough.

Topper

I think I am going to play the slav. After all you just have to learn from D10 to D19. You can also cut it shorter playing ...a6 and it is D15. Against the english A11, A12 and we have the same structure. Now I need a good book about the slav.

I don’t know that I agree with TopNotch; we don’t yet know whether all openings are equally playable. I expect in due course, possibly within our lifetimes, the game will be solved and we shall know, probably, that all reasonable replies to 1 d4 draw. But I wouldn’t be surprised if some mainstream openings – the Benko for example – turn out to lose in 517 moves with best play, and some are shown to force Black to play many more best moves to hold than others.

But hopefully I shan’t be alive to see the day, and anyway in truth we probably have no idea which of these openings are which.

Eric; I guess we’re seeing in Elista! But to be sure against 6 Ne5 most people are playing something with …Nbd7 and …Qc7 now, either the Morozevich 11….g5 or else various versions of 11…f6. And the line of game 6 is coming into fashion and no doubt going to be more so.

But the trend is away from 6 Ne5, I think, after it’s success in the 90’s. 3 Nc3 and 4 e3 is said to be the future, basically trying to head off the traditional main line at the pass. But then you can’t go Bg5 against the semi-Slav, so the Meran can be expected perhaps to swing back into fashion.

IMJohnCox wrote on 10/10/06 at 22:22:31:


If you don't mind John, I wonder if you could elucidate a little on what particular lines of the Slav are considered best these days?  For instance, I thought the old "main line" with the Bishop sac was under some pressure.

Actually Gazza very seldom played the Nimzo and when he did generally played it dreadfully (relative to his strength of course).

Once upon a time (say 20 years ago) most GMs would have said the Nimzo/Queens complex and the Tartakower were the two soundest defences. One of the things that most surprised me when I returned to chess in 2002 was how the stock of the Slav and semi-Slav had gone up. Today it would be an interesting call. I'm not sure you'd find the same unanimity as you would with 1 e4, where I think most feel that 1...e5 and 1...c5 are clearly ahead of the rest. But the above four would be the top four, I'm sure of that.

The Nimzo indian has always been popular, I think.