1.c4 players

Originally posted by !~TONY~!
One book I really like that's come out Nigel Davies' "The Dynamic Reti". ... , the material is quite good. ...

1. Nf3 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. b4!?

... The b-pawn causes all kinds of problems!

Have you actually tried playing this line? I can tell you that I have - with shockingly bad results.

The Davies book, as far as I know, is the only choice at the moment for players wanting to investigate 1. Nf3 - which is a shame because its deeply flawed in places

e.g.: the 1. Nf3 Nf6, 2. c4 g6, 3. b4 chapter contains a game that blatantly plagiarises some analysis from an earlier work

[ http://streathambrixtonchess.blogspot.com/2007/04/echo-echo-echo-echo-echo.html ]


The book also lacks depth in a lot of chapters

[ http://streathambrixtonchess.blogspot.com/2007/04/reti-confusion.html is just one example ]

but, having said all that, does contain some useful information for opening systems analagous to 1. c4 and in some chapters directly transposes into an English set up.

Originally posted by JonathanB of London
Have you actually tried playing this line? I can tell you that I have - with shockingly bad results.

The Davies book, as far as I know, is the only choice at the moment for players wanting to investigate 1. Nf3 - which is a shame because its deeply flawed in places

e.g.: the 1. Nf3 Nf6, 2. c4 g6, 3. b4 chapter contains a game that blatantl ...[text shortened]... ning systems analagous to 1. c4 and in some chapters directly transposes into an English set up.

My results have been Ok with the 3. b4!? line against the KID. There are some other books on 1. Nf3 out. Donaldson wrote a book called "A Strategic Repertoire for White", which is based on 1. Nf3. A new edition is apparently making an appearance soon. Angus Dunnington wrote a book called "Easy Guide to the Reti" which covers the pure Reti set-up in alot more lines. As far as the plagiarism goes, well it's sad as it does appear a little blatant once they're compared, but as far as the reader goes, it doesn't really matter. Whether Keene wrote it, or Davies wrote it, is inconsequential, since the comment is on the page and that's what you have to read. It doesn't affect my chess in any way. As far as lacking depth goes, that I'm not surprised about. Repertoire books in general, especially by Everyman, who seems to enjoy enforcing a strict 144 page count, are a little wispy on some coverage. Nowadays their books are larger, and I think they get the picture. But, at least it's not a 1. e4 repertoire book. When you play 1. Nf3 it's really more understanding based, and a lack of coverage probably won't hurt you as badly.

Originally posted by smrex13
There is an older book by Andrew Soltis called "Winning with the English Opening" that focuses on the same move order as Kosten's excellent "Dynamic English" (2.g3). Soltis gives Reti-type lines against Slav and QGD set-ups (Kosten's coverage of these lines has received some criticism). Soltis also give some other options vs. the symmetrical. Combining th ...[text shortened]... l repertoire.

Scott

p.s. Make sure to get the revised edition of the Soltis book.

The latest edition of "Winning with the English" is the third edition. It should still be available at http://www.labatechess.com

Originally posted by !~TONY~!
My results have been Ok with the 3. b4!? line against the KID. There are some other books on 1. Nf3 out. Donaldson wrote a book called "A Strategic Repertoire for White", which is based on 1. Nf3. A new edition is apparently making an appearance soon. Angus Dunnington wrote a book called "Easy Guide to the Reti" ....

I'm not sure the Donaldson book is widely available here (Britain) although it maybe but I've not seen it. The Dunnington book also is not easy to track down - and I suspect it's out of print.

I don't agree with you about the other stuff but that takes us off topic and anyway, there's no rule that says we have to agree about everything is there :-)

I own both the Dynamic english which is a great starting out/repertoire book. In particular, I dislike his style of play against both 1 ... d5 (or 1. c4 Nf6 2. g3 d5) and against the symmetric (meaning that I really only like 2. g3 against 1... e5).

In particular his line against the reversed dragon is flawed as can be seen in this USCF game

[Event "Iowa Corr Chess Championship"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "2006.10.01"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Kmetz, Shawn"]
[Black "Knudsen, John"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "A20"]
[Annotator "Kmetz,Shawn"]
[PlyCount "52"]
[EventDate "2006.10.08"]
[SourceDate "2006.10.08"]

1. c4 Nf6 2. g3 e5 3. Bg2 d5 4. cxd5 Nxd5 5. Nf3 {
You must 0-0 before attempting d4. I doubt john will allow d4 anyway.} Nc6 6.
O-O Nb6 7. d3 Be7 8. Nbd2 O-O 9. a3 a5 10. b3 Be6 11. Bb2 f6 12. Qc2 Qd7 (12...
Nd4 13. Nxd4 exd4 14. Bxb7 Rb8 15. Bg2 Nd7 16. Nc4) 13. e3 Rfd8 (13... Bf5 14.
Ne4 Rfd8 15. Rfd1) 14. d4 exd4 15. Nxd4 Nxd4 {This is Kostens suggested line.
p. 50 the other variation is what he explores but doesn't like for black...} (
15... Bd5 16. Bxd5+ Qxd5 17. Nxc6 Qxc6 18. Qxc6 bxc6 19. Rfd1 a4 20. b4 c5 21.
bxc5 Bxc5 22. Rac1 Ra5 23. Rc2 Rb5 24. Ra1 Bf8 25. Ra2 Rbd5 26. Bc1 R8d7 27.
Kf1 $16) 16. Bxd4 (16. exd4 Bd5) 16... c5 17. Bxc5 (17. Bb2 Qxd2) (17. Bc3 a4
18. Rad1 Nd5 19. Nc4 axb3 20. Qxb3 b5 {and black is much better}) 17... Rac8
18. b4 Nd5 (18... Qxd2 19. Qxd2 Rxd2 20. Bxe7) 19. Nb3 (19. Nb3 b6 20. e4 bxc5
(20... Nxb4 21. axb4 bxc5 22. Nxc5 axb4 23. Nxd7 Rxc2 24. Nb6) 21. exd5 Bf5 22.
Qa2 axb4 23. d6 Qxd6 24. Nxc5+) (19. Rfc1 axb4 20. Nb3 b6 21. e4) (19. Rfd1
axb4 20. Bxd5 Rxc5 21. Bxe6+ Qxe6 22. Qb2 bxa3) (19. e4 Nxb4 20. axb4 axb4 21.
Nb3 b6) 19... b6 20. e4 Nxb4 21. axb4 axb4 (21... bxc5 22. bxc5 (22. Nxc5)
22... a4 23. Na5 a3 24. c6 Qc7 25. Qc3 a2 26. Rfc1) 22. Rfd1 Qc7 23. Nd4 Rxd4 (
23... Qxc5 24. Qxc5 bxc5 25. Nxe6) 24. Rxd4 bxc5 25. Rdd1 c4 26. Ra6 (26. Rab1
b3 27. Qc3 Qe5 28. Qxe5 fxe5 29. Rdc1 c3) 26... Qe5 (26... Bf7 27. Bh3 Rb8 28.
Rd7 Qc5) (26... b3 27. Qc3 Bg4 28. Rd4 Bc5 29. Rd2) 0-1


Due to my dislike of playing Ahlekine setups against 1... c5, I bought Hansen's tome on the symmetric english which I rather like but it is not conducive to studying unless you have tons of time, or as the positions come up in correspondence games (how I've used it). It has doubled it's use as I play the Rubenstein and it had interesting analysis of
1. c4 c5 2. g3 Nf6 3. Bg2 d5 4. cxd Nxd 5. Nc3 Nc7 6. d3 Nc6 Bxc6
a line I have played as both white and black with success.