BPaulsen wrote on 08/23/11 at 05:26:12:
In the Flank Openings white normally isn't going to play d4 that early and enter a standard Anti-Benoni.
My argument wasn't that White would.
BPaulsen wrote on 08/23/11 at 05:26:12:
Black playing hope chess for an Anti-Benoni transposition is a waste of time,
My argument wasn't that Black should.
BPaulsen wrote on 08/23/11 at 05:26:12:
he should put the bulk of his study into the critical Symmetrical English variations he's more likely to end up in.
My argument wasn't that White shouldn't.
BPaulsen wrote on 08/23/11 at 05:26:12:
Those critical variations, by the way, have zero in common with a Benoni
My argument wasn't that they have.
My argument was that the Benoniplayer has to learn the Symmetrical English with an early d4 anyway and that it thus makes sense to look at 1...c5. That includes White's setups without d2-d4 indeed. I just assumed that readers are smart enough not to need me to point out that specifically.
You haven't contradicted this. Also note that I did not really contradict you; it's more like an addition. That's why I wrote "not entirely true". This implies that it is for the largest part true indeed, at least when formulated in Dutch.
Fortunately Bottomdweller seems to have understood this.
As a sidenote: White played about 5 500 times the Anti-Benoni with 3.d4 or 4.d4 (I haven't specified on move order; nor have I included lines like 1.c4 c5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Nf3 Nc6 4.d4). That's considerably less than the early Kingside Fianchetto: 10 000 games. But it's not negligible.
You still may be right that the early d4 is toothless of course. I never have checked, because when playing the Benkö I was only interested in the Kasparov Gambit (because of 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.Nf3 cxd4 4.Nxd4 e5). Of course I looked at 1.c4 c5 2.g3 and 2.Nc3/3.g3 as well.