The Chessbug Opening repertoire for White

Part 3

Repertoire for White 

For White we wanted an “all in one book” repertoire that will not be based on mainlines of 1 e4 or 1 d4. For this reason we decided against Palliser's book, which in general we recommend but we were afraid it may be out of date relatively fast, as it covers mainlines played by the world's top players. For some time we contemplated 1 f4, where we could rely on our knowledge from 1...f5 for our system as black. Unfortunately, we did not succeed in putting our hands on Timothy Taylor's Birds Opening: Detailed Coverage of an Underrated and Dynamic Choice for White (Everyman Chess) so we cannot tell you how good it is and whether it fits with the black side of our repertoire but you may check it for yourself. Then we thought of using Zenon Franco's Chess Explained: The English Opening. Starting with 1 c4 is not as boring as many people think – most of the pieces stay on the board for a long time and the tension of the position is maintained. Another point for 1 c4 is that the English Opening is based more on general understanding of plans than on concrete variations that change from day to day. Moreover, the book contains only twenty five games so we were hoping for a very fast learning curve.

The disappointment was as big as the expectations. There are just too many options that Franco's book does not cover (for example if Black answers with 1...c6 or 1...b6 or if Black combines 1...e5 with a later ...g6 and ...Bg7) It may be that for the seasoned 1 c4 player these are options of minor importance that may transpose to one of the other lines. However, for an amateur who tries a 1 c4 repertoire for the first time Franco's book does not cover enough. Too many times you are surprised over the board and when you come back to Chess Explained: The English Opening you find that the line was not covered in the book.

* chessbug@chessbug.com

We went back to the drawing board and there, on the drawing board, lay our answer - Gambiteer I: A hard-hitting chess opening repertoire for White (Everyman Chess) by Nigel Davies. This book suggests a repertoire that is a match made in heaven with our guiding principles - risky, attacking, unbalanced and entertaining. Davies' suggested repertoire is based on 1 e4 with a gambit as soon as possible - the wing gambit against the Sicilian and the French, the Danish gambit against 1...e5, the Fantasy Variation (3 f3) against the Caro-Kann and so on in this spirit.

What can we tell you? We flipped through the book, we tried the repertoire and we are having the time of our life. It is not that you win every game with this repertoire but every game is so alive, so full of fire, creativity and surprises that every game is a great joy. This is the perfect repertoire to develop your tactical abilities and your chess creativity. If you played too many Queen Gambits lately this is also the repertoire that will revive your interest in the game. You just burn the bridges behind you and are forced to continue the attack. You give many mates but also learn to laugh when your tricks backfire and you learn to know when is the moment to go to an endgame a pawn down. Many times when you transpose to an inferior endgame you find that you can take advantage of the fact that your opponent has not fully adjusted to the fact that you are in the endgame now. We will give some concrete examples in one of our coming columns but for the time being let us just say that after our short and unfortunate adventure with the English Opening, this “gambiteer” repertoire is simply a source of pure chess pleasure.

Gambiteer I is the kind of book that uncovers the difference between what's good for an amateur player and what's good for a professional player and how this difference is not emphasized enough by most chess websites. If you look, for example, Carsten Hansen's review of Gambiteer I for ChessCafe.com, you will see that Hansen gives the book a mild 3/5 rating but admits that this book is actually pretty effective for developing your tactical and creative abilities. It is clear that had Hansen been writing for amateurs (like we do in Chessbug) he would have given this book a higher rating.

Gambiteer I suggests an exciting repertoire that will provide you with thrill, joy and chess capability development, all included in one book. The only reason not to try this book is if you are too afraid to end the opening a pawn down. If you are too afraid than please remember (and here we freely quote Jonathan Rowson's The Seven Deadly Chess Sins) that there is no physical threat to you when you play a game of chess and the worst thing that can happen is that you lose the game. Furthermore, if you build yourself a reputation of a speculative player, who is happy to drag the opponents into muddy water where both of you can drown then it will be your opponents, eventually, who will feel intimidated (Lasker, Alekhine, Tal, Morozevich and Topalov have all made a nice career based on this strategy). When you find in yourself the courage to enjoy chess openings, grab Davies' book and have good hunting!