Play the Berlin Wall - Openings

The Berlin Defense is a popular variation of the Ruy Lopez opening .It is played by black.

3.Nf6 is the Berlin. Usually the game continues as follows:

You might think that White is better as Black can't castle but Black's structure is almost unbreakable. For example in the 2000 World Chess Championship , the Berlin was played 5 times by Kramnik against Kasparov and all the games ended in a draw. One popular line goes as follows:

Here, even though black lacks in development and the king is in the center without the privilege of castling ,White cannot make any breakthroughs into Black's position as  the two knights don't have much scope. After something like Nd4, Ng6 attacks the e5 pawn and after Re1 Ke7 Rad1 Re8 the position is equalish and it is easy to get a draw with careful play.Some other lines include the bishop coming out early and the king going to c8 with idea of b6 Kb7 and then closing play in the queenside with the pawns and the other pieces controlling the center and closing play on the kingside.

If you have any question please ask it in the comments.

Thank you.