alekhine 1.e4 Nf6 2.Nc3 Nxe4

???????????

Why not 

Too risky for me. Sacrificing a pawn in the opening is OK at times , but a whole piece? That's different!

@kendis : basically, u tell 2.Nc3 is ok for black because of 2...d5, but white then played bad lines against you, and not the main line with 4.e6, which is not only interesting, but testing and often crushing...

See these 2 games :

The only real test if u want to play 2...d5 is 3.e5 d4 but then u have to find a good replay to Hector (him again, yes) 's variation 7.Qf3! :

Not so simple as u see...

That's the reason why Timothy Taylor tells in his excellent book Alekhine alert!, that he prefers to go back into Vienna or 4 knights with 2...e5 because 2...d5 is so tricky for black...

1.e4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.e5 Ne4 is the other alternative for Black, scoring about the same as 3..d4.  Against the best move 4.Nce2 (somewhat unintuitive at first glance, but White causes important problems by denying Black the ability to exchange this piece) f6 5.d3 White gets a normal advantage.

A nice game by Petrosian there. I guess the pressure is on to perform well when you have been purposely named after a chess legend and steered into chess as a child.

<GreenCastleBlock> if white can get the advantage after 3...Ne4 4. Nce2 - then why play 3...Ne4?

3...d4 is simply equal. White has nothing. 

3...d4 allows White to force a queenless middlegame with slightly better structure and that's not to everyone's taste.  White's advantage in the 3..Ne4 lines is small and the positions are still complex.  I'm guessing Black wants to fight if he is opening 1.e4 Nf6!?

I feel like this makes Bc4 look silly, it is probably better to be on e2 or d3

3.exd5 and Bc4 is a respectable approach, which can be also reached on scandinavian 2.Nf6.

Some games to illustrate the dangerousness of this system :

Thanks for the nice games Poucin!