Hi.
Confused_by_Theory wrote on 05/04/21 at 22:09:17:
What I can say is that against
1.e4 g6 2.d4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.Be3 a6 5.h4
you want to go 5...h5 or 5...h6 directly.
If
1.e4 g6 2.d4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.Be3 a6 5.Qd2
White is slower and you are (mildly) freer to not include an early h-pawn move.
E.g. 5...b5 6.f3 Nbd7 7.h4 c5!? (Edit: even though this idea has more point with a Nf6 instead of Bg7)
and even if say 5...Nf6 6.h4 happens you can still postpone deciding where to put the h-pawn with say 6...b5 7.f3 Nbd7
At some point moving the h-pawn when white has done h4 is natural though, so it may only be a practical point.
I notice people, starting early 2021, have started picking up on a key line, so I guess I might as well expand a bit.
The problem with
1.e4 g6 2.d4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.Be3 a6 5.h4 Nf6Which asfair has been recommended by multiple authors. Appears to be that white can just ignore the added defense of the h5 square with:
6.h5!?And after the capture with the knight, looking like the only thing that works positionally, white actually has quite good compensation for an exchange.
6...Nxh56...Nbd7?! 7.h6 Bf8 8.g4 b5 9.g5 b4 10.Nce2 Nxe4? 11.f3 Nxg5 12.Bxg5 (+-)
6...Rg8?! 7.h6 Bh8 8.Qd2 Ng4 9.Bg5 f6 10.Bh4 g5 11.Bg3 Rg6 12.f3 Nxh6 13.f4 gxf4 14.Bxf4 Nf7 15.Rxh7 (+/-)
7.Rxh5! gxh5 8.Qxh5 (D)We get a situation where white has very easy development and can push pawns forward against a mostly undeveloped black position. It's not really looking so fun for black. That is even though black has a few different ways of trying to get his pieces out. Most of them basically see him under some kind of pressure. For example:
8...h6!?Perhaps a slightly weird move. The idea is something like preventing Bg5 so Qe7 becomes a viable place for the queen and perhaps at some point not giving white a Bh6 move.
9.O-O-O e6 10.e5 Nc6 11.f4 b5 12.Bd3!? Ne7 13.g4 Qd7 14.f5 exf5 15.Nge2 (+/=) to (+/-) With seemingly quite nice compensation.
8...Nc6 9.O-O-O Bd7?9...e6 10.e5 or 9...h6 10.f4 avoids disaster and can go into the line I gave after 8...h6!?.
10.Bc4 e6 11.d5! exd5 12.Bg5 Qc8 13.Nxd5 Ne5 14.Bf6! (+/-) With very serious pressure.
Best practically is probably 8...Qd7!?. The only move played in correspondence in fact. Even so it does look like white had a pretty comfortable position and I wonder if it's not more menacing to just play slowly with 9.Be2.
[Event "WS/CCM/A/15"]
[Site "ICCF"]
[Date "2020.12.18"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Beveridge, Colin"]
[Black "Egan, Michael"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[ECO "B06"]
[WhiteElo "2294"]
[BlackElo "2270"]
[PlyCount "68"]
[EventDate "2020.??.??"]
1. e4 g6 2. d4 Bg7 3. Nc3 d6 4. Be3 a6 5. h4 Nf6 6. h5 Nxh5 7. Rxh5 gxh5 8.
Qxh5 Qd7 9. Bc4 Qg4 10. Bxf7+ Kf8 11. Nd5 Nc6 12. Ne2 Bd7 13. c3 Qxh5 14. Bxh5
e6 15. Ndf4 Ke7 16. f3 Raf8 17. Kf2 Nd8 18. Rh1 Nf7 19. g4 Bf6 20. Ng3 a5 21.
Nh3 Rhg8 22. f4 Bh4 23. Kg2 e5 24. f5 Ng5 25. dxe5 dxe5 26. Bc5+ Kf6 27. Bxf8
Rxf8 28. Nxg5 Bxg5 29. Rd1 Ba4 30. b3 Bc6 31. c4 Kg7 32. Kf3 Rd8 33. Rxd8 Bxd8
34. Ne2 Bg5 1/2-1/2
Have a nice day.
P.S. it's also kinda to late to play 5...b5 with effect e.g. 1.e4 g6 2.d4 Bg7 3.Nc3 d6 4.Be3 a6 5.h4 b5 6.h5 Bb7 7.h6 Bf8 8.a3 Nf6 9.d5 and sure white has extended somewhat, although on the other hand black's position makes a very odd impression. This coupled with the 6.h5 line after 5...Nf6 is why I say black wants to go 5...h5 or 5..h6 after 5.h4.