I am glad you mentioned the 9...a5 line which looks playable. The variation (game) mentioned in Bogdanov's book is interesting. I like his "developing the rook without moving it".

As far as I recall, the move 9...a5 got a "bad a rate" after a rapid game between Leko and Ivanchuk a few years ago. It was annoted here, I think by John Watson.

But the idea mentioned in Bogdanov appears to give 9...a5 a reasonable rate for an alternative move

Michael Ayton wrote on 02/05/10 at 16:01:45:

me too

lg wrote on 02/05/10 at 12:03:29:


Crafty how he managed to get that plug in   
In seriousness though, that line with ....f5 always looked extremely dodgy to me, as far as I can remember White has no need to play f4 and can just develop simply also, when Black is hard-pressed to justify all his weaknessess.

As far as I see Neil McDonald's recommends this move together with f5 and makes a reference to the
Leninegrad Dutch and to the fact that he is writing a book on it

[quote author=2B282224450 link=1250652709/124#124 date=1265323908]

Incidentally, the new 1 e4 ... update has some interesting stuff on the Voronezh ...[/quote]

It seems unfair that white can get away with all those moves on the queenside just to clear the diagonal and kick the knight when it emerges on c6, but chess isn't always a "fair" game :-)

Nevertheless, it always seemed to me that if there was a good answer to the Voronezh, it probably involved f5 just because white is so far behind in development on the kingside. I looked at that Milliet-Mirzoev game when it appeared in TWIC a couple of weeks ago. Food for thought - though far from conclusive because it must be pointed out that black was over 200 points higher rated than white.

Sjakkalle wrote on 02/04/10 at 13:31:21:


Cox's book remains the best of recent vintage, but there really is no book on this defense that I would compare to gold.  Objectively I would say that Cox's book is a worthy bronze medal.  This arises simply from the nature of the Starting Out series and is no criticism of Cox, whose work is invariably outstanding.  

Theory has expanded so much that a new edition comparable to those perennial Bagirov books would require two volumes, one for the Modern, and one for everything else.  But this will never happen since chess publishing is stuck in a rut of beginner books and narrowly focussed repertoire books for practical players.  Marin's English project is the exception but the Alekhine isn't popular enough to make the analogous Alekhine project commercially viable.

I will just put in a plug here for the recently-formed Alekhine Defense Working Group, which is attempting to produce a coherent analysis of at least some key variations, and possibly eventually, a set of notes on the entire defense.  The group is private and anyone wishing to join should message me privately.  We are up to 10 members although so far, we don't seem to be getting much done.

Our one tentative analytical conclusion so far is unfortunately negative: Marin seems to be wrong, in his ChessBase Magazine article, that 8...O-O is viable in the critical 7.Ng5 variation of Alburt's Variation.

Hansen gives this book 5 Stars out of 5 in his ChessCafe column that came out today, but says that it is aimed at 2200 and under players. This may account for some players discomfort with its contents.