doefmat wrote on 09/08/19 at 15:33:33:


This move does indeed deserve attention, if only because Black has scored well from over 250 games!

But I think it's a bit suspect and White should be able to gain an edge; possibly not with the stereotyped 7 Bc4 Nb6 8 Bb3 Bg7 though - this scores badly for White - but maybe with 7 Qb3, which seems to force Black to weaken his position with 7...e6 (7...Nb6 allows 8 d5!), after which 8 Nc3 might be enough for a small but long-term advantage.

7 Qb3 has been the choice of some strong players; it scores 60% from the 35 games I found. It's also the top line for the Stockfish 12 engine.

For further research it might be useful to compare with
a) 6 Bc4 Nb6 7 Bb3 g6!? (8 cxd4 would transpose to the line with 7 Bc4 mentioned above) which has also been played by some strong players but in this particular move order Dave Smerdon endorsed 8 Ng5! (Esserman-Djukic, Cappelle 2016);
b) the similar line in the English: 1 c4 e5 2 Nc3 Nf6 3 g3 c6 4 Nf3 e4 5 Nd4 Qb6 or 5...d5 6 cxd5 Qb6; in the Alapin line obviously White is a tempo up, which is likely to be important in such a semi-open position.

doefmat wrote on 09/08/19 at 15:33:33:

5...Nf6 blunders a piece, and 6.g6 is illegal.

Did you mean 1.e4 c5 2.c3 Nf6 3.e5 Nd5 4.d4 cxd4 5.Nf3 Nc6 6.cxd4 g6?