Aziridine wrote on 05/16/14 at 18:40:07:


I notice that back in NCO Emms preferred 14. Ra2, and thought 14. Bb2 to be unclear (with Black pushing his queenside pawns and not his h-pawn).

Just incidentally, this 3...Bb4 with subsequent transposition to the Botvinnik-Capa line occurred today in Eljanov-Bologan (0-1, 52).  Once upon a time (well, about 13 years ago), Drazen Marovic wrote that Ljubojevic had been "the last of the Mohicans" to play it with Black.

I believe that there was a Dangerous Weapons or Secrets of Opening Surprises chapter devoted to 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cd ed 5.Bg5 Bb4, which might interest you also.  Generally these lines have been thought of as better for White but within the bounds of playability.  

As you've already discovered, the biggest issue with 3...Bb4 will be dealing with transpositions that you may not want to allow, i.e. 4.e3 Nf6 is a Nimzo line you might not want to play.  As Kylemeister points out, there are ideas involving an early ...c5 and putting the knight on e7 instead of f6, which while probably no better than the Nimzo transposition, at least lead to more original play.

Well, ...b6 and ...Ba6 is a standard thing in the line Aziridine indicated (Botvinnik-Capablanca being a classic example).
Some other "book" possibilities in the move order under discussion involve ...Ne7 instead of ...Nf6; for example 5...c5 6. cd ed 7. e3 Nc6 8. Bd3 Nge7 9. Ne2 c4 10. Bc2 Bf5 was considered as leading to += in ECO.

Without doing any preparation or research whatsoever when i saw this as White I always played 4.Qa4+ Nc6.   I would think even cxd5 should be good for White however Black recaptures.  I played Chigorin QGD as my mainline for years, so perhaps I feel Black's pain vicariously with N/c6 and a blocked B/c8 and no chance of e7-e5 break.  It's like you sat on a motorcycle but you have a flat tire.  I'm sure statistically and engine-wise it's fine though.

So, what is a Ragozin player to do if he wants to avoid the QG exchange? I have been playing the NID move order (Nf6, e6, Bb4). I play an early d5 in response to Nf3, Qc2 or e3 aiming to minimize repertoire complexity. However there is a fair amount of work to learn the sidelines and still the problem of how to face the English Opening after 1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3. In my hopes of steering the English into the QG/Catalan lines which I already know, I came up with:

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4. Thus far in ICC blitz, it just usually transposes to a ragozin or NID/Ragozin hybrid. So, what's wrong with 3...Bb4? Rank amateur analysis attached.