Hello

Perhaps a bit late and out of scope since the current fashionable news is about the piece sacrifice in the cxd6 line.

As a summary I think Kornev's book is a nice addition to the Alekhine bibliography.

But this does not mean i was not disapointed for  a few reasons (some of which have already been pointed out before)

When reading this  book, I had a similar feeling when reading John le Carre's latest book "A legacy of Spies).
John Le Carre is a famous English Espionage fiction writer and in this latest book he brings back famous characters that have appeared in some of his books of 40 years ago.

The analogy is the following: When reading "legacy", I reached a point where I thought "Great! this is becoming interesting" and then noticed that only 5 pages were remaining until the end of the book.

When reading Kornev's book, I had a similar feeling when I reached the first page on the modern 4.Nf3 line and noticed that only a few pages were remaining (and thus, the type of analysis that appeared in previous sections could not be replicated in this final section).

I liked his suggestions (even in the Voroznev), there were rather modern suggestions (mostly based on recent ICCF games - as someone here already said) but we see some options from Black without no explanation why they were taken when. In earlier sections on "minor" variants, explanations and even alternate were given.
For instance in the 4PA he even discusses and dismisses several alternative 9th move moves for Black. I am not saying that he should discuss other alternative 4th lines for Black in the modern (he gives a nice short summary) since he proposed 4...g6. But in some lines, I would liked to see more "meat".

One other point is the games that he refers to in teh middle of the text. With exception to recent ICCF games (and you need to be aware of them) and a few well known games, most of the references are to not well known games, and and it is difficult to relate to information we know from other books

Anyway, a nice addition to the Alekhine

So far I‘ve put the first half of the book into my personal files, and while this is no studying yet it’s already deep glancing.
Kornev’s book is certainly not the result of several weeks or a few months but the fruits of his many years as chess coach for top junior players! Maybe Kornev hasn’t played the Alekhine much on his own but probably he prepared many junior students for high level tournaments with this reserve weapon for special situations!?

A large part of chapter 3 (2.d3 e5 3.Sf3 Sc6 4.g3 d5 5.exd5 Nxd5 & Nb1-c3 following) is basically about a transposition to the Fianchetto Vienna / Glek 4Knights.
In the Exchange line of the Scandinavian sytem (last white exit to chicken out) Kornev has several interesting options for Black to unbalance the game, backed up with original analysis.
Also against Chase Variation and 4.Bc4 there are some interesting points I didn’t know before (and I have all English/German Alekhine books of the last 40 years).
For the moment the only weak point is still the Greet2011 line where Black is a little bit passive and where Kornev stops several moves before Greet.

Two typos:
- p.63 right: „(Bishop)ex“ is neither „Rex“ nor „Lex“ or „Mex“ but indeed „Bex“ (a swiss player)
- p.278 last line: there’s one „Rc8“ too much

tracke

Does Kornev explain why he selects 4...g6 as a reply to the modern?

thanks

Yes, Pantu, you might say that Kornev is not advancing the theory greatly. There are probably no groundbreaking novelties, no secret weapons, no fascinating analysis deep into the blue ...
Kornev is always very close to games you could have seen at Megabase, TWIC or ICCF databases. Many suggestions one half-move away from a game, seldom a longer line. But selecting, organizing and slightly annotating the material is also of great value! And as I am considerably weaker than Kornev, I can not really appreciate the value of those „slight annotations“. But I believe that author and publisher have done a good job!
If you play the Alburt according to Marin‘s CBM surveys from 2009 AND IF you have closely followed all important otb and corr games since, then you might not need this book. But then you could restrict yourself to Bagirov‘s classic from 1984 if you have analyzed all later games on your own!?

IMO Kornev‘s book ist a must-buy for all Alburt players and at least a should-buy for all Alekhine players 1800-2300 (probably also for stronger players but I don’t want to judge that). Even if you prefer the ed exchange and the Miles then you have nice & extensive coverage of the 4PA with 9...Be7 and some interesting choices in the minor systems.

Certainly it’s risky to choose the Alekhine as your main weapon against 1e4 and use Kornev as only source. That might work but it’s probably not advisable.
Either you use Alekhine only as one weapon among others, when you play for three results but not in must-win situations. Or you have it as main weapon: then you must have several options against each white system! In my case this means Alburt & Miles & Bg4/e6 main line, both exchange systems, 9...Be7 and 5...g6 against the 4PA , Vienna and 2...d5 etc.

The problem with opening theory nowadays is that any club player can do the mechanical part of opening preparation on GM level.
My opponents are 1900-2400 and I don’t care if a GM playing on GM level with my Black repertoire could not generate enough winning chances ...

tracke

Got my copy this morning! For the first time this year I had no time preparing a meal so I was forced to call the pizza delivery...

Interesting book, good book. Certainly not the ultimate revelation we all dreamed of (black theoretically equal, practically better), but definitely useful.

The usual style of Kornev: dry and objective. Good in dealing with transpositions (especially important in the cxd exchange systems without Voronesh).
288 pages with 446 diagrams. Many games until 2017, a handful from 2018. The most recent one I noticed was Dai - ZhaoJun from december 27th 2018. Many correspondence games, especially in the critical systems heavily relying on games from Schmidt and Pavlov.
But, and it is a great but, generally only offering one move for Black, often without even mentioning (much more often played) alternatives.

I try to give some details without revealing too much (the author and the publisher deserve you buying the book!):
- 36 pages about 2.d3 is probably too much. You learn something about the Reversed Philidor and about positions that could have arisen from 1f4 e6 but that was certainly not necessary...
- The Scandinavian 2.Nc3 is answered with 2...d5 (3.e5 d4 4.Nce2 Ng4! or 4.exf6 dxc3), again the analysis looks fine. But 28 pages on 3.cxd5 Nxd5 could have been shortened
- The Vienna Attack 3.Nc3 is well explained, also in the chapters on Chase Variation, 4.f4 and 4.Bc4 I saw some interesting ideas and good explanations
Okay, now the real meat ...
- The 4PawnAttack is answered with 9...Be7, following Kunzelmann-Pavlov, ICCF2016 very far. Kornev rejects all other systems with short lines.
- The Exchange is answered with 5...cxd6 and 9...e5 in the Voronezh („only way for Black to fight for equality“, other possibilities like 9...Bf5 aren’t even mentioned). Kornev here relies heavily on corr games 2015-17.
- In the Alburt with 8.Qf3 there is a long note about 12.Qc3, basically referring to Laffranchise-Pavlov, ICCF2015 but improving/deviating before move #20 („Black should gradually equalise“). I cannot say if it really minimize black‘s problems as I‘m not familiar with the analysis here on ChessPub ...

Kornev‘s bibliography doesn’t have Greet2011 and Shaw2014. The latter one is absolutely no problem but Greet‘s recommendation is a little bit nasty ...

I may put it that way: if you have 5 big and 10 little problems in your Alekhine repertoire before reading Kornev, you might afterwards have „only“ 4 big and 6 little problems. Kornev helps but he doesn’t heal ...

But that’s only my first impression and I’m just an expert patzer

tracke

Is this the Catalan or the Spanish alphabet?

In the site they say

"In the Alekhine Defence, contrary to the classical methods of playing in the opening, Black does not fight for the centre with his pawns, but begins to exert immediate pressure against White’s centre. Black’s knight on f6 attacks the pawn on e4, and if it advances, then Black’s d-pawn joins into the attack against it. The Alekhine Defence is particularly applicable in encounters against players who are inferior in class, as well as in games with a short time-control. This opening is not used so often in practice, so your opponent might lose plenty of time to recollect the opening theory. That might prove to be a very negative factor for him in the forthcoming fight."

Today I saw a very interesting game between

Pourramezanali (2528) - Firouzja (2618) of the Iranian Champ,

in the line

1 e4 Nf6 2 e5 Nd5 3 d4 d6 4 Nf3 g6 5 Bc4 Nb6 6 Bb3 Bg7 7 Ng5 e6 8 Qf3 Qe7 9 Ne4 h6

White did not follow the critical 10.exd6.

The game followed

10.Bf4 Nc6 11.exd6 Nxd4 12.dxe7 Nxf3+ and looked interesting. Both players sacrificed their rooks in h8 and a1.

I did this before but do not remember how to post the game here