New in Chess Yearbook 139

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New In Chess Yearbook, which appears four times a year, contains the latest news in chess openings. Each issue brings you dozens of new ideas on the cutting edge of modern chess opening theory. Have a look at what this issue has to offer.

Forum

This issue’s Forum Section features an article by René Olthof on the stunning piece sacrifice with which Fabiano Caruana took Maxime Vachier-Lagrave by surprise in the second leg of the Candidates Tournament. This is followed by some unique analysis material by Ganguly on a game he lost against Pavel Eljanov! Two other grandmasters, Mikheil Mchedlishvili and Max Warmerdam, also made a contribution, and you should certainly check out IJntze Hoekstra’s short but intriguing note to the book Side-Stepping Mainline Theory by Gerard Welling and Steve Giddins!

From Our Own Correspondent

Our GM correspondent Erwin l’Ami starts his column with a good equalizing method for Black in the Tarrasch and then presents a thorough analysis of a correspondence game with the Delayed Poisoned Pawn in the Najdorf. L’Ami has played the Black side of Kramnik’s QGD endgame and demonstrates that Black is OK here – which cannot be said of his two final subjects, the Poisoned Pawn line in the London System and the Winawer French with 7 ... 0-0.

Reviews

Part of Glenn Flear’s Reviews column is dedicated to modern media again. The 2-volume ebook The Modern French by Kryakvin is reviewed and compared to two other recent works on the French: Anish Giri’s awesome Lifetime repertoire course; The French Defense (for Chessable) and Pentala Harikrishna’s book Beat the French Defence with 3.Nc3. The Englishman also pays attention to Ilya Smirin’s book Sicilian Warfare – arguably more than just an opening book – and of course the latest masterpiece by Parimarjan Negi: Grandmaster repertoire: 1.e4 vs Minor Defences.

Opening Surveys denne gang:

1.e4 openings

Sicilian Defence - Najdorf Variation 6.Be3 - Ganguly

Sicilian Defence - Scheveningen Variation 6.g3 - Mchedlishvili

Sicilian Defence - Rauzer Variation 7.Bb5 - Ganguly

Sicilian Defence - Four Knights Variation 6.Ndb5 - Vilela

Sicilian Defence - Four Knights Variation 6.Nxc6 - Stella

Sicilian Defence - Closed Variation 3.d4 - Bosch

French Defence - Exchange Variation 4.Nf3 - Lalic

French Defence - Tarrasch Variation 3...Nf6 - Moskalenko

Ruy Lopez - Berlin Defence 4.0 - 0 - Ponomariov

Ruy Lopez - Early Divergences after 3...a6 4.Ba4 - Ris

Ruy Lopez - Open Variation 9.Nbd2 - Talsma

Italian Game - Giuoco Piano 4.c3 - Flear

Italian Game - Early Divergences 3.Bc4 d6 - Sokolov

Scotch Opening - Four Knights Game 4.a4 - Bosch

Scotch Opening - Mieses Variation 4.Nf6 5.Nxc6 - K.Szabo

Various Openings - Nimzowitsch Defence 1...Nc6 2.d4 - Tzermiadianos

1.d4 openings

Slav Defence - Slow Slav - Panczyk and Ilczuk

Slav Defence - Semi - Slav: Meran 6.Qc2 - Olthof

Tarrasch Defence - Semi - Tarrasch 4.Nf3 d5 - Adams

Nimzo - Indian Defence - 4.Nf3 Line - Ikonnikov

Queen’s Indian Defence - Bogo - Indian 3.Bb4+ 4.Nbd2 - Timman

Grünfeld Indian Defence - 4.Bf4 Line - Lukacs and Hazai

King’s Indian Defence - Classical Main Line 7...Bg4 - Fogarasi

Queen’s Pawn Openings - Double Fianchetto 6.b3 - K.Szabo

Others

English Opening - Symmetrical Variation 3.b3 - Cummings

Forordet til redaktør Jan Timman:

Right at the start of the second half of the Candidates Tournament in Yekaterinburg, Fabiano Caruana beat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in a game that Kasparov labelled as ‘the best prepared game in the history of chess’. Undoubtedly Caruana had spent countless hours on this specific line of the Najdorf Poisoned Pawn. There is not a Survey yet, since we will have to await further developments in the line, but a brief report on the game can be found in the FORUM Section of this Yearbook.

Congratulations to Ian Nepomniachtchi for winning the Candidates. His most significant theoretical contribution in this Yearbook is not from this tournament, though, but from the Magnus Invitational earlier in the year. He tackled the Berlin Defence in his own way. Ruslan Ponomariov wrote a Survey on the line.We welcome Surya Sekhar Ganguly as our new contributor. As a long-time second of Anand he has an extensive knowledge of the openings. His two Surveys are about important new developments in the Sicilian – in the Rauzer and in the Najdorf.

Anish Giri is probably the best prepared top player at the moment. I became interested in his way of handling the Bogo-Indian against Radjabov in the Opera Euro Rapid and decided to write a Survey on this subject.In his correspondence chess column, Erwin l’Ami focusses on a line in the French Winawer that I used to play myself, a quarter century ago. His conclusion: it is not playable for Black. I must admit that I’d had this feeling already for quite some time.