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Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa gained his second major victory of the year when he followed up his success at Wijk aan Zee by winning the Superbet Chess Classic Romania. In the penultimate round in Bucharest, the 19-year-old Indian star rolled the dice a little as Black against Wesley So, opting for dynamism, the Benko and a position he may have thought wouldn’t entirely suit his opponent. It paid off as So would later go astray in the resulting complex position. As I stand in for the Ginger GM, we’ve plenty of other complex positions to enjoy exploring too this month, in both the Benko and the Dutch.

Download PGN of May ’25 Daring Defences games

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The Benko Gambit Declined: 4 Nd2 bxc4 5 e4 e6 [A57]

I used to think of 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 c5 3 d5 b5 4 Nd2 as a positionally decent sideline, but nowadays it seems fully defanged by 4...bxc4 5 e4 e6!:

After 6 Bxc4 Be7 7 Ne2 exd5 8 exd5 d6 9 0-0 0-0 10 Nc3 Nbd7 Black didn’t have any particular problems and was soon able to play actively in Velten, P - Lagarde, M.


The Benko Gambit: 4 cxb5 a6 5 e3 axb5 6 Bxb5 Qa5+ 7 Nc3 Bb7 [A57]

The latest engines suggest that after 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 c5 3 d5 b5 4 cxb5 a6 White’s two best moves are to take on a6 or go 5 e3. Then a pretty critical line runs 5...axb5 6 Bxb5 Qa5+ 7 Nc3 Bb7 8 Bd2 Qb6 9 Nf3 Nxd5 10 a4 e6:

White has a few options here and opted for the uncompromising gambit 11 e4!? Nxc3 12 Bxc3 Bxe4 before later being gradually outplayed ahead of rather collapsing in So, W - Praggnanandhaa, R.


The Benko Gambit: 4 cxb5 a6 5 bxa6 g6 6 Nc3 Bg7 7 e4 0-0 [A58]

The modern way of playing the Benko is, of course, based around meeting 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 c5 3 d5 b5 4 cxb5 a6 5 bxa6 not with 5...Bxa6, but rather 5...g6 6 Nc3 Bg7 7 e4 0-0:

In this tabiya White must decided how aggressive he or she is feeling. The positional path is 8 Nf3 Qa5 9 Bd2 Bxa6 10 Be2, but Black has more than one route to emerging with sufficient and standard Benko compensation here, as we’ll see in Lesiege, A - Bischoff, K.

The direct and critical path is 8 e5!? Ne8 9 h4! when it seems that Black can get away with 9...Bxe5!, so should probably grab the pawn. Then 10 Bh6 Qa5! is a new move for us:

We’ll explore it in fair detail in LCZero - Stockfish, the notes to which reveal what happened when the two leading engines also reached this position with colours reversed.



The Dutch: 2 Bg5 g6 3 e3 Bg7 4 h4 [A80]

Meeting 1 d4 f5 2 Bg5 g6 as White with 3 e3 Bg7 then 4 h4 feels a little strange to me, in part because 4...h6 5 Bf4 d6 is an obvious and decent counter for Black, and if 6 Bc4 Nf6:

Black is all set to follow up with ...e6, then ...Qe7 and ...e5, thereby obtaining a relatively comfortable set-up, as we’ll see in Sargsyan, S - Klimkowski, J.


Leningrad Dutch: 7 b3 e5 [A87]

For a long time it was thought that 1 d4 f5 2 Nf3 Nf6 3 g3 g6 4 Bg2 Bg7 5 0-0 0-0 6 c4 d6 7 b3 was a decent alternative to 7 Nc3. Black has deployed many different approaches here over the years, but 7...e5! 8 dxe5 dxe5 just looks like a good one:

With ...e4 imminent, White already needs to be accurate to maintain equality here, and he was quickly destroyed by the world no.1. in Baltabaev, T - Carlsen, M.


Leningrad Dutch: 6 c4 d6 7 Nc3 c6 8 Qb3 [A88]

After 1 d4 f5 2 g3 Nf6 3 c4 g6 4 Bg2 Bg7 5 Nf3 0-0 6 0-0 d6 7 Nc3 both sides have several options, including 7...c6 8 Qb3 when 8...Na6 9 Bf4 is all fairly natural:

Here 9...Qb6 looks like an obvious and good counter, which after 10 Qc2 saw Black quickly beginning to provoke with 10...Be6!? in Goganov, A - Rapport, R.



I’m sure Simon will be only too happy to bring you more daring Dutch dynamism over the coming months. Enjoy! Richard

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