Anti-Fried Liver?

Thanks, that was #3 of my original 3 candidate lines (see above).

It thwarts White's attack, but at the expense of Black not being able to put his g-Knight on its best square, f6.

The main line gives Black a *better* position provided that he knows to play energically so that not to lose the development advantage. I mean this:

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5 c6 7.dxc6 bxc6

and now the main continuations are 8. Be2 or Qf3. After 8 Qf3 the best answer is 8...Rb8 (yes, sacrifice another pawn for easy development). Black is better but, if he plays quietly, White will catch up in development while maintaining the material advantage.

 I would think a 40 year old book is quite out of date (especially in the opening such as the two knights.)

Yakov Estrin was the correspondence World Champion and an OTB GM, I think you can trust most of what he has to say, I certainly do. It's not like the romantic lines of the 2KD see much modern praxis at the top level. I'm sure there's more modern books, charging an arm and a leg, and I'm sure the bibliography for that volume will cite Estrin prominently. It's a cheap little book that does the business. Does a 1600 player (or 2000 player for that matter) require the very latest theory? I doubt it. Most of my library is 30+ years old and it's relevent enough to be of use to me.

Is 40 years such a long time? I don't think so, probably means I'm getting old then.

Thanks for the tip. But as a novice I was advised to play the following:

White: Giuoco Piano, Scotch Game, Four Knights' Game

Black: Two Knights' Defense, Caro-Kann

I particularly like the Scotch, Four Knights and Two Knights. For the last of these, my aim is to find a good defence to 4.Ng5, hence this thread.

 The guy asks a specific question about how to proceed in the Two knights defence and you come out with some nonsense about "d6 dutch". Why do you bother? is it merely to annoy everyone on this site with a grain of sense?

btw we know you play the Trompowsky.

4. ...Bc4!? (or is it 4. ...Bc4?!) puts white on notice.

 Try telling that to Nakamura after he beat Friedel in 21 moves in the final round of the US Open with the Fried Liver.

Not many of the "really good players" allow White to play the FLA, its avoided like the plague. Usually only patzers play 5 .... Nxd5, the attack White gets for the piece is ferocious in the extreme. In my experience, Black would only allow the FLA if he had a Theoretical Novelty he wanted to test OTB.

True. Although Black might be better, it is extremely hard to defend against such an attack OTB. Also, you need to think a lot from the early stages of the game, meaning that there is a high probability of getting into time trouble. 

 I don't doubt that it isn't a good book.  Just that I would not use it as an only and definitely not blindly(Although I would say that about any book I pick up).

There were recent developments(as recent as a year or 2 ago, unfortunately I got a nasty virus and lost all the opening downloads that I had made.  So unfortunately I could tell you nothing about what they were) 

Just to clear things up

The Fried Liver Attack is the following variation:

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Nxd5 6.Nxf7!?

Personally I prefer the Lolli Attack with 6.d4!

The Two Knights Defense is the variation you have asked about:

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5

Here I turned the motif on its head and played it as White ;-) The discussion in this forum has helped me alot. Having said that, it was poor play by my opponent that allowed me to do it...