tnan123 wrote on 12/05/16 at 03:00:51:


I didn't consider this thread, but I broke the symmetry with 6. .. Bxc3 in a recent game. 

That I could play .. Ne7 did occur to me and 8. .. Ne7 was played in response to 8. h3 .

Ne7 is a nice move to play, because you can then harass the white square Bishop with moves like a6 and b5. Throw in c5 as well and there's a threat to shut out the Bishop. You might force c5 to be played, locking the Bishop inside the pawns.

kylemeister wrote on 12/05/16 at 02:16:09:
I'm curious if you remember what the article said about 7. Ne2? True the four knights may not be the most ambitious, but it seems that Wei Yi and Arkadij Naiditsch don't mind it. They seem to be the current folks to turn to for ideas in this opening. I'll definitely take a look at the games of Nunn, Short, and Chandler as well!

I took a look at this recently myself and I like how the OP compared it to the 4. d3 antiberlin. I'm going to have to examine this more myself! I agree this seems to be a very playable system in 1. e4 e5 games. The fact that you can use the four knights as a secondary weapon against the Berlin, Petroff and even Alekhine's at times is quite attractive. It seems the top players are switching to the Italian more... maybe the four knights is next to come into fashion? 

I notice that MCO (2008) basically had it as leading to "a minimal advantage for White," citing a game Campora-Atalik 2004 (which went 13...Qe7 instead of 13...Bb6 in the last line).

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bb5 Bb4 5.0-0 0-0 6.d3 d6 7.Ne2!?


I'm currently planning to incorporate the Spanish Four Knights into my repertoire because it's not only playable against the Petroff but also against the Berlin. In the Berlin I usually played the d3 line, going for this normal plan with c3, 0-0, h3, knight to g3 and then d4. However If black did his homework then it's not so easy to do so. In most cases black simply is a bit faster and he can equalize with d5. Just a sample line:



But now let's look at the 7.Ne2 line. Here black actually has numerous moves he can play because whites last move is of course not as forceful as the 7.Bg5 mainline. But in practice there are only two moves that are played. Those are 7... Bg4 and 6... Ne7.



Do I overlook something? I think it's a bit weird that this line is played so rarely in comparison to the main line and considering that white simply gets a small advantage in all lines, if I'm not mistaken.
However there is also one problem with this line. Black can avoid it with 6...Bxc3!? 7.bxc3 d6. Then white can transpose to the main line with 8.Bg5 or he can play 8.Re1 Qe7 9.d4 (9.Bg5 again transposes) which is an additional option now. Again I think that white has good chances of a small advantage. So what's the problem with this line? I don't see a line where black easily equalizes (although the Four Knights is often called unambitious and unproblematic for black)...