Against The English Opening

I have never had a real system in place to meet this opening, which is kind of odd because its a serious try. Please recommend me something to play against it...

1..c5 I find my self in maroczy binds and other uncomfortable positions...

I play 1.d4 so playing 1..e5 reverse sicilian seems like my opponent will have the upper hand (especially if they pay sicilian as black as well.

Against d4 I play the benko, but playing nf6 g6 bg7 seems like it would just transpose to a symmetrical eventually,since most english players use it to avoid mainlines and wont play d4.

What about 1..b6?

If you like to play the Benko Gambit, why don't you play the Jaenisch Gambit against c4? It starts with your favorite b5, your opponent probably does not like it and you are comfortable in such a position.

what a weird coincidence yesterday i thought about looking at the jaenisch gambit to play correctly against it

i thought the jaenisch is against e4 by the way

I play the symmetrical english.

Reason is that I play the sicilian against e4, and I don't mind the Maroczy. It's pretty rare for it to occour anyway, in my experience, because English players will prefer to have the setup with e4-d3-c4, to which I counter with the mirror image e5-d6-c5. Of course the e pawn could be one square back for each player.

The position seems pretty boring but there's isn't much you can do as black to avoid boring positions if white wants to play them (he can do that all the time).

While this way of playing isn't the best for a win, it's pretty straight forward and I absolutely didn't feel I needed to dedicate to c4 the same preparation effort I gave to d4.

Do you mean 1.c4 b5 ?? Ive actually done fairly well with it in some games ive tried, but im hesitant to play it in a long time control game OTB, I jut dont get the same compensation.

@plutonia, that was the same thing i though, but i just came under a lot of pressure all he time (probs playing it wrong, but it was just unnatural).

1..b6 looks ok so far I think, considering both GM rep and dynamic english recommend 1.c4 2.g3, it will frustrate the plan a bit. I find it very rare an english player will transpose back to d4 lines, so tryingt to hold off and get a benko seems pointless.

i have recently been trying out the hedgehog, it's pretty fun and has a nice positional type trap very early on which a lot of c4 players don't seem to know about. it goes...

1. c4 Nf6 2. Nc3 c5 3. g3 e6 and here if they develop their bishop as normal you play 4. Bg2 d5! then they cannot blockade the pawn from going to d4. for example 5. cxd5 exd5 6. d4 cxd4 7. Qxd4 Nc6 8. Qa4 d4!

Funny. I play Ben-Oni, but will not play Benko Gambit. Why should I give a pawn to get play, when I can get it too not giving that pawn away? So, I thought you prefer positions with active play and bring your opponents in positions they might not like.That is why I thought you might like the idea of the Jaenisch Gambit (1. c4 b5).

I play not only the Ben-Oni, but also the Dutch defense starting with f5. It is a way to prevent e4.

What lines were putting you under pressure?

You mean the queenside counterplay? There are ways to stop that, and if white commits too much on the queenside you can launch an attack on the kingside starting with f5.

Take a look at this short thread:

http://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-openings/quick-question-in-the-english

Have a look at the Romanishin:

1.c4 e6 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.g3 a6 4.Bg2 b5

Like the Benko. Black strives for early queenside play, and like the Benko, it's not 100% sound.

Because it's terrible.  The Benko Gambit is played after White has committed to closing the center at cost of time with d4-d5 which makes a huge difference in the play that follows.

Not true.  1.c4 c6 2.e4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.d4 is the Panov Botvinnik, a respectable line.  This move order is annoying for Slav players who do not play the Caro Kann against 1.e4, i.e. they play 1.e4 e5 and 1.d4 d5 (intending 2.c4 c6) for Black.

@GreenCastleBlock: I would not play the Jaenisch Gambit, I also do not play the Benko Gambit. But Fear_itself does and the positions in a gambit seem to suit his style, because he has good results with it. That is the most important thing. Tal became WC playing his style, not playing objectively good chess. He was not concerned with that, other players like Petrosian did.

If you take a look at the results of the Jaenisch Gambit (although I have recently in another discussion argued that results are not directly related to the opening, unless the opening is bad), then you see that there are not many draws and that black and white have more or less equal chance to win. I think that those numbers come from the fact that only people who like gambits and feel comfortable playing them, play those openings. They play their style of game, and although they ought to lose objectively, those players find better moves in this kind of positions then their human counterparts.

I agree with you that the opening is not good objectively, but it might be very good subjectively. Twenty years ago I played some blitz chess against a player which had several hundreds elo points higher. I had at that time something like 1700 points, he had almost 2200. After the first game I noticed that he was a very solid positional player and did not like it when there was an attack with sacrifices going on. Well, you can guess how I played all evening? I have won almost all games on time and the other ones in the attack. If you are comfortable in a certain type of position (and your opponent is not), play that game.

BTW, I looked at the results at www.365chess.com, because you have there more results (52).

Let's say your goal is to attack the English with Black pieces.  What's wrong with, say, a reversed Grand Prix? 1.c4 e5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.g3 f5!  Heck, GMs even play a reversed Open Sicilian with Black pieces via 2..Nf6 and 3..d5! (Albeit the theory is much different, you don't usually see Black castling long.)

I don't agree that the Jaenisch produces attacking chess.  White wins a pawn without having to commit to a structure, misplace any piece, and he still has both of his center pawns.  If Black is able to make White go on the defensive it's the result of taking him out of his usual English type positions and not because White has a position that needs to be played defensively.

This very abstract argument over objective vs. subjective can only be taken so far.  Soon we will be advocating Black take a White 1.e4 player out of book via 1...f5 2.exf5 Nh6! (which actually has some positional basis btw, more so in my opinion than the Jaenisch)

If you would advice me, then you would be at the right address, because that Grand Prix attack would indeed be something I like to play. Thank you for pointing it out, I will definitely take a look at it. :-)

If you however take a look at what the OP is saying, then is he saying that 1. ... e5 is not an option for him. Hence, although there is nothing inherently wrong with the Grand Prix, it is not what he believes that will be a good choice for him.

Taking the opponent out of English type positions and dragging him in positions the OP likes is exactly why I proposed the Jaenisch.

The Jaenisch and Benko are not about the misplacement of pieces imo, but about quick development of the queen side and giving the bishop on c8, in a lot of openings a problematic piece to develop, opportunities to take part of the action.

1. e4 f5 2. ef5: Nh6 3. Qh4+ Nf7 is not something I would advice. It almost hurts to the eye. I understand your point that if quality of an opening is not relevant, what is then a guideline for advice? I would say playing style of the OP.

Usually Black can play almost any QP defensive set-up against the English (Dutch, Kings Indian, etc), whichever you play against d4. The main difference being of course that White has not played d4; and if it looks as if he is going to play d4, you just transpose. Personally I like the symmetrical c5, and if White goes in for a c4-d3-e4 setup, I counter with c5-d6-e5 and then its a matter of who gets the b or f pawn break in most effectively. I stopped playing the English as White because it seems to give black too much of a free hand in developing. Plus I got bored of it lol

but isnt it to much hassle to learn the symmetrical english for just a side oppening.

Its true that some of the given suggestions are possible and alright, but I have repertoire problems with many of them.

Grand prix- I dont play e4, and I havnt played sicilian for a while. Playing the Grand prix, which an english player will play against as white and also likely black (often english is taken up by sicilian players) means they are much more accustomed to the positions.

KID- I dont play KID as black and I avoid it nowadays as white, learning it and all its ideas and theory for something that isnt all that common seems like a lot of work for little payoff.

Dutch- I dont like the d3 e4 lines that white may use since he hasnt commited d4.

Symmetrical- feels unnatural, maroczy positions and some annoying Q side play which white probably does every 3rd game just feels like Im getting dominated, even if the position is objectively =.

@sonofabishop67 Unfortunately the benko/benoni setup doesnt really work against it, itll just go into a symmetrical if I use the setup.

@Loek, its a good idea, though as castle pointed out its not as clear as the benko where my compensation is, and I feel as though I will be the one who will have to prove something, which seems daunting for OTB play.

@duck and cover, thanks ill look into it.

@hurricane, slav is very far from positions i play, other than the very rare transposition i get into a caro kann panov, and even that isnt all too similar.

Well, how about lines with ...e5 and ...Bb4 (after white plays Nb1-c3)? One of the things I  liked about the English was transposition possibilities into more familiar openings. It also seemed to catch a lot of my opponents off guard...however, 1.c4 really isn't as much of a 'sideline' as some here might suggest. It's actually played frequently by top level players, behind d4 and e4 of course. Heck, even Fischer tried it once!