Black has doubled pawns and cannot castle, so how can black be better in the final position? My stockfish engine rates the final position as half a point better for black. I am learning how to defend the Maroczy Bind as black and could use some help because all the resources I check seem to write off the e5 push as simple foolishness - what am I missing?
Critical Line in the Maroczy Bind, Gurgenidze Variation
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That's an interesting question. Here's a game where white plays the suggested line from game explorer. Of course black is a pawn ahead, despite being doubled and it is a central one. Black does well if white doesn't trade in the other two games...viz taking the pawn on e5
Will have to look at from the white side !
TrueFiction wrote:
Black has doubled pawns and cannot castle, so how can black be better in the final position? My stockfish engine rates the final position as half a point better for black. I am learning how to defend the Maroczy Bind as black and could use some help because all the resources I check seem to write off the e5 push as simple foolishness - what am I missing?
Me guesses that you either forgot to count the pawns, or you think losing castling rights is the end of the world.
Let's see what we have here:
- Black has lost castling rights.
- He has doubled pawns.
- He has no pawn more.
Well... white usually does not bother achieving that position, simply because his advantage is somewhere between "tiny" and "nonexistent".
In the case of the Gurgenidze, white has a pawn less, no advantage in development, no direct threats, and as a whole insufficient compensation for his small investment.
Transform the position!
What do you see now?
I see a king that is centralized ready for the endgame.
I see a 7 vs 6 pawn favor in black.
I see whites only chance for winning is to use his queen side 3 to blacks 2.
However, I see a black king in the right spot to stop that from happening.
I see blacks chance for winning is to use his king side majority vs whites minority.
