The Very Latest Developments
Frommania!! The August 2002 UpdateThree From Gambits in one update, is it possible? I had a lot of letters this month, so don't forget to have a look at my E-mailbag. Also, why not drop-in at the July 1 e4 ... update if you have access to it, as guest contributor Tony Kosten (one of my favourite players!!), examines the Panov Attack, which is a particularly useful weapon for Flank Opening players against 1...c6. TonyK |
All this month's new games are easily downloaded in PGN format using ChessPub.exe, but to download the August '02 Flank Openings games directly in PGN form click here: 
English Opening
1...e5
A21: Following 1 c4 e5 2 Nc3 Bb4 3 Nd5 In Agrest,E - Sasikiran,K we have a good look at the strange move 3...Bd6!?
                     
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whereby Black plans to bring his bishop to c7 (after ...c6).
A25: Vallejo Pons,F - Smirin,I features novel play after the unusual, but very playable, 1 c4 e5 2 Nc3 Nf6 3 e3!?.
A28: In the Four Knights line with 4 a3, one of Black's sharpest tries is 4...e4!?
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which has a good reputation. Or rather, 'had' a good reputation, as in the game Beliavsky,A - Turov,M, Beliavsky finds a stunning innovation on move 7 which almost refutes it!
A28: Solleveld,M - Sutovsky,E provides a lesson in how to keep a tactical initiative, and one more reason to avoid 4 d4 at the moment!
1...c5
A35: Ftacnik,L - Lesiege,A examines a sharp sideline in one of Kramnik's favourite openings for White.
1...Nf6 & others
Incidentally, I saw an interesting article by Junior Tay in Correspondence Chess News, issue 37, from last year concerning a pawn sac line that I recommend in The Dynamic English. In it he analyses his game against Christov, and gives a lot of useful explanation about the ensuing positions. It is well worth a look, and you can download it at ftp://ajec-echecs.net:45000/CCN/ccnews37.pdf
Réti
A09: Following an email from subscriber Howard Williamson (see my E-mailbag) I have had to re-examine the game Gabriel,C - Korchnoi,V - there are two major improvements, one for each side.
A09: Wonderful reversed Benoni play from 'Spec' in the game Speelman,J - Koneru,H, crowned by a most surprising, and beautiful, combination where the b2-bishop moves away from the a1-h8 diagonal... in order to conquer this very same diagonal!
A14: Fellow 'ChessPublishingite' Ruslan sent me an email concerning his game against Aleksandrov from my June update: «In fact, the final position was almost winning for White - I attach the game against Alexandrov with some brief comments for the database» which you can compare with my original, but no explanation as to why he agreed to the three-move repetition - time trouble, I guess.
Bird's
A02: Subscriber Charles Curry III asked me to analyse two variations in the From Gambit (see the E-mailbag).
The first line is 1 f4 e5 2 fxe5 d6 3 Nf3 which is analysed to some depth in the encounter Danielsen,H - Hardarson,R, and the second is 1 f4 e5 2 fxe5 Nc6, again considered in some detail in Reddmann,H - Langrock,H.
By chance, there was also a very interesting game played in one of the mainlines this last month, Grunberg,M - Kotronias,V, which features the endgame after 1 f4 e5 2 fxe5 d6 3 exd6 Bxd6 4 Nf3 g5 5 d4 g4 6 Ne5 Bxe5 7 dxe5 Qxd1+ 8 Kxd1 Nc6 9 Nc3 Be6
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The game features a useful innovation from Black, but how, oh how, did he manage to avoid winning?
e-mails
Don't forget to pop over to my August E-mailbag!
Please feel free to share any of your thoughts with me, whatever they are, suggestions, criticisms (just the polite ones, please), etc. Drop me a line at tonykosten@chesspublishing.com
Till next month, Tony K