Friday, April 19, 2013

The Two Knights Anti-Modern


I have posted analysis of a line I like to call "The Anti-Modern," which opens 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.d4 exd4 5.e5 Ng4!  Black's last move immediately puts pressure on White's advanced pawn on e5, making it difficult for him to both defend that pawn and to try to regain the pawn at d4. In this way, it is the perfect "dark square" system against the Modern.  The repertoire is inspired by James Schuyler's discussion of this line in his excellent book The Dark Knight System (where he reaches it via the move order 1.e4 Nc6 2.d4 e5 3.Nf3 exd4 4.Bc4 etc.), and I have mostly followed his suggestions. I have mainly played these positions from the White side, but I must say that I am more likely to play them from the Black side in the future!

This is the first in a series of articles that will examine lines discussed by Schuyler, whose excellent book ends up covering a lot of varied and interesting territory.  I will also post a full review of this book, which you can meanwhile learn more about from an excerpt and video from Everyman Chess.


1 comment:

Ian Simpson said...

A fine summary- it's becoming increasingly clear that 5.e5 Ng4 is hard for White to crack. I may even consider using it myself with Black (I have generally used 5...Ne4). As White I think I'll stick with the 5.0-0 lines for now!