Line against the French?

I have a lot of trouble playing against the French. It seems no matter what I do, I can't exactly keep my center intact and black always has very good play. Can anyone suggest a line against the French for me? Thanks.

There's a sideline in the Nc3 variation that's pretty good and lets you hold onto the center pretty well.

@jphillips: Hey, that looks very nice! It was the sort of thing I was looking for. However, what if my opponent decides to play a Winawer with 3......Bb4? That was one of the things I was worried about with the 3.Nc3 variation of the French. Is there any similar line with the Winawer instead of the Classical French?

Not that I know of.  White can do just fine against the Winawer though.  Here are some lines.

Also against the Winawer you can play exd5 instead of e5 after black plays Bb4.  The positions are a little less wild.

There's always the Exchange variation if you want to avoid Black's pet lines.

The exchange variation is good if you play the variation with c4.  You'll probably end up with an IQP structure.

I agree.  The Winawer is tough to play, so it can be beneficial to avoid it until you've studied it enough.

If you like IQP, you can play the Tarrasch, with the idea of answering c5 with c3, Nf6 with Bd3 and Nc6 (after c5) with Ngf3. There is a line or two you must know, but else it's a quite acceptable system opening. Gives the theoretically IQP positions a move down.

The French Defence is very resilient. If memory serves me right Karpov couldn't break through Korchnoi's French.

Yet it's curious that it hasn't been played in recent world championships to the best of my knowledge. I don't recall Short playing it against Kasparov in 1993 - so despite being his main defence, he must have thought that at the highest level , questions could be asked of it.

At club level it's very popular. Even though my preference is for the Sicilian, I find myself often on the verge of playing the French as black.

I would like to see some world championship matches played with the defence.

Here it is:

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1017839

I note Short doesn't venture the Winawer.

I've started playing 1.e4 some. What do people think of the milner barry gambit?

Good up to a point. Then when and if you reach a higher level you need something else,which begs the question why not play something that will stand you in good stead against the stronger players as well as those of a relatively lower one.

Well, I'm more concerned with reaching fun, playable positions with 1.e4 than I am with getting a slight advantage. OTB I would likely play my usual 1.c4 stuff that gives me a slight +, but I would like something a bit more fun to play.

I've also considered the Korchnoi gambit, which had a recent forum post about it here.

if you play 1c4 and 1e4 you might wish to consider the Monte Carlo variation:

http://www.kenilworthchessclub.org/kenilworthian/2009/08/french-defense-monte-carlo-exchange.html

Normunds Miezis enters it via 1c4 e6 2e4 d5 3ed ed 4d4

This way you keep what you have to learn to a minimum

Funny story, I once had a tournament to attend and was thinking about what to play against 1.c4. I decided just before leaving I'd play 1..e6, the 2.e4 variation was annoying in my mind since I didnt play the french but I flicked through some games on the database to get a feel for it, and figured no one would play it anyway.

So I turned up for what was my first round, and I was running slightly late, so I only looked at what table # I was on without checking for my opponent.

The game started 1.c4, "at least they still may play 2.d4", I thought, 2.e4. As I had just been through some grandmaster games I was super surprised to see that white follwoed for the next 8 or so moves what was essentially mainline theory, for such an obscure system.

Anyway, long story short, I got crushed, and my opponent happened to be Normunds Miezis, who was in australia for a short while. So I essentially walked into his pet variation, not even knowing I was playing against a GM.

Yes, I like e6 against c4 as black. I think the Monte Carlo is a variation to know from both sides.

Do you have the game against Miezis ?

Just looking at Miezis on 365chess.com.

He scores 49/35.6/15.4 from the start of the variation

Unfortunately not, it was a blitz tournament. Im yet to play a GM in standard time controls OTB.

The variation itself im not too fond of. White doesnt really generate much play. I appeals neither to more more usual positional side, nor my current aggressive state.

It would be pragmatic though.