My Sicilian for White is Terrible

Hi all,

I am terrible against the Sicilian defense. Against Nf6, I play the Rossolimo, and I'm not so bad. But when I face d6, my w\l is terrible. Any suggestions? I tried the canal attack, but I don't like it. Too suffocating and I don't get good positions. Or maybe I need to try it more. 

Any suggestions for something against d6? Many thanks in advance.

The Open. I'm 900 and I'm doing well with it. You'll definitely do well as a 2000. Most of the time you're probably gonna face a Najdorf- try and choose a line you feel comfortable with against it. Maybe it'll be the English Attack or the mainline. Maybe it'll even be the Freak Attack.

You're gonna have to be ready against the Scheveningen, the Classical, and the Dragon(s), though, but they really aren't that bad if you know your stuff

Have you ever tried 3. d4?

The Moscow and the Canal Attack are the exact same thing.

I played the Prins for the longest time.

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.f3!

Black basically has 3 options.

A) 5...e5 6.Nb3 and now 6...Be6 or the endgame with 6...d5

B) 5...Nc6 and either 6...Qb6, which is a line you simply must know, or else it will almost always transpose to the Accelerated Dragon Maroczy Bind

C) Black can play for a Hedgehog type of position.

There is a whole book on it called "Steamrolling the Sicilian", which is not a full Sicilian repertoire. It basically gives White a full repertoire after 2...d6. You have your answer already for 2...Nc6. You'd still need something for 2...e6.

dont forget, this is our average chess.com player

against the najdorf you could always learn the fischer sozin because it gives active position at the cost of your bishop being kicked around, but there are tons traps and tricks that black can easily fall for

agianst the classical you could allways learn the richter-rauzer attack and try to castle queenside and do a quick f4-f5-g4

agianst the dragon you could learn a pile of theory and make sure blacks on their sharpest game by playing the super sharp tactical main line

You could try open Sicilian, or Moscow because it’s kinda similar to Rossolimo. Prins Sicilian is also good for a positional squeezy game as thriller fan suggested

If you do enter the open Sicilian, I would go for generally English and Yugoslav attacks tbh. But Bg5, Bc4 and Rg1 Najdorf are also fire 🔥

Fr. Alapin Sicilian gatekeepers fr fr fr 😂

Just make better moves! You're not helpless. You can look for some YouTube videos or read a book.

That's what makes the Open the most interesting for me as you are always going to get a different style of game.

I don't think it's that hard either. Against the Dragon and Classical, there are good scoring default lines, but also decent alternatives if you want to try something different.

Against the Najdorf, you have a wide variety of choices to try out. You can try out the main lines, like Be3 and Bg5, and look for different ideas, or look for a decent personal sideline.

I don't know what you played. I understand, however, that a lot of people play the English Attack by default (since it's the top GM line) and then they say they feel like they are playing the same thing every game. I don't really play the English Attack so I can't say though.

I prefer Bg5 as it has way more variety and different ideas to try out. If I want to mix it up, I like Bc4, the Fischer-Sozin Attack. Or if I want to try out something else and go for a totally different tone of game then I'll play h3 Adams Attack or f4 Amsterdam.

I think you don't have to learn so many long lines of theory, like some people say. As long as you have some idea of about the 1st 10 moves or so (that's 5 after the tabiya positions), and other good chess skills, anyone should be perfectly ready at lower levels.

thats kinda why i play the classical sicilian

its not theory packed and relays on knowing the plans and common variations and tactics that appear

then you get to the najdorf where you have to know around 6+ lines to make it out alive

(english,fischer,Bg5,h3,Be2,g3,Rg1)

and there are all the sidelines that you should also know, but you can usually still go for a basic e5-be6-be7 type of play

play this https://openings101.org/?search=closed&color=white&tag=sicilian+%28e4+c5%29 Nc3 really fun to play

I reckon the grand prix attack - it's sharp, aggressive, and will likely force lower-rated sicilian players out of theory. Or you could just go for an open sicilian and watch as your opponent spits out 500 moves of Najdorf theory.

you can try different move orders, but this is unavoidable

then you can get this

which do you think white (the attacker) would perfer?

I think the bishop on b5 is far better than the bishop on c4 in the Grand Prix attack:

And yes, I understand that the open sicilian is probably slightly better objectively, but seasoned sicilian players will know what they are doing and potentially punish your mistakes. So I think the Grand Prix is a solid option.

but what if black delays Nc6 untill the bishop has moved? you will have to put it on g2 or c4

and black still gets his easy d5 break and Nd4 and b5