1c4 d5 - what is the best way to approach

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Wahidz

Hi Gurus,

I only play 1 c4 or english as white for the last 2 years, formerly e4 player.

As English opening i prefer that the game is semi close where i can either attack queenside or king side with central pawns in the board.

How to best approach 1c4 d5, i usually do 2 cxd5 black will do Qxd5 then swing his queen on h5 waiting for my g3 -Bg2 then eliminate the Bg2 via Bh3.

I found it iritating that i cannot do my g3-bg2 formation.

What is the best way to play 1c4 d5?

Should i accept that i need to play english without g2/Bg2 formation when Q is in h5?

Or i'm missing something?

Thank you very much and more power to Chess.com

Wahidz

Thank you very much benkku52 for the reply, appreciate it a lot.

I always hesitant to move d4 unless in the middle game as i felt moving d4 will put me on d4 opening instead of english c4. i even lost few games avoiding d4 and played d3 even d4 is what the board is telling.

some books/articles say "if you want to stay on english teritory play d3, playing d4 might transpose to d4 opening territory (sea of theory).

kensaikid

Catalan is pretty good opening for white. And it's familiar =)

amartalon

In my opinion if you play the English you should be prepared to transpose into d4 lines, although you can quite often avoid them.

amartalon

Well the advantage of being an amateur player is that you don't really need to know your theory too well.  All I know are the mainlines of my openings and the basic strategic ideas.  I don't really learn any variations well enough to remember OTB, and yet I almost never get a bad position out of the opening, regardless of what line I play.  Most of the games I lose are due to mistakes in the late middlegame.

varelse1

I used to have a little handheld chess device, that would play this as black all the time. I developed a core line versus 1...d5, that I ue as the branching point for all human players who play it against me.

Of course, none of that is forced. Just my little computer like stepping into it. But white seems to get a good gme, regardless of where black varies.

GuyBielderman

What also helps in this variation is to look at 1.d4 d5 2.c4 Nf6 3.cxd5

  • a) 3...Nxd5 4.Nf3 prevent e5
  • b) 3...Qxd5 Nc3 and then Nf3 just to prevent e5