Open sicilian for beginners and semi-advanced players

In this blog I'll try to give you guys an introduction in the open sicilian by posting the most played lines and variations. Note that those should be used purely to get an idea of possible variations, instead of just memorising all the moves, try to understand why a move is made, before making it, or you''ll get in trouble later!

For those interested, here's the blog: http://blog.chess.com/view/open-sicilian-for-beginners-and-semi-advanced-players

Any reactions, constructive critism or other remarks are appreciated.

Peter,

Thanks for you comment, English is of course not a problem, it''s an international forum. The reason I started with the sicilian is because I like the opening a lot, play it usually and therefore I started with that. 

In my opinion, beginners shouldn''t study openings at all, but focus on tactics indeed. Nevertheless lot's of beginners and some more advanced players like to study openings after all. Difficulty here is the level of someone called ''beginner''. One might say someone that hardly knows how a knight moves is a beginner, but men might also argue that a player like me (or possibly a little below my level) is still a beginner. I just want to build some opening repertoire for those interested, whatever level they are.

But I can follow your suggestion by making my opening repertoire, as I like to expand it to more openings, more interesting by choosing both tactical and positional openings. I am nevertheless not that familiar with the morra-Smith opening, but as in my knowledge, beginners shouldn''t start playing gambits right away, but they should play 'decent' openings instead, to try and increase there game. Later on, gambits are indeed useful to improve your tactics and possible positional skills.

Since I am not a 'good' player, I don''t know all the ideas behind different openings, therefore I am unable to suggest why some moves are played in a certain opening, so hopefully some people will help me to make those suggestions, so that people can optimally learn from it. We'll see in the near future, hopefully, if this topic leads to any interest, causing my to increase my opening repertoire. For now, I'll take a look at the Morra-Smith and see what I can make of it.

Yes, nice job. Thanks.

I made a more lengthy response which seems to have been lost in internet land but basically I'm curious if you will explain why some one would choose the Najdorf in stead of the classical, etc. What is some one trying to achieve/avoid?

I think the Scicilian is a lot of fun, it seems to lead to some chaotic, complicated middlegames.

As I said earlier.. I can surely try to explain some of the moves made with the ideas behind the moves, since that is how you can really understand a position. The point there is, that since I am not near a great player, it can be difficult for me to fully understand the ideas behind the moves myself. 

But your comment makes me realize that it can be a good training for myself too, to annotate the games more. Perhaps discussion can come out of it, that will make both myself and the readers better off. I'll try to annotate the games!

He might have a point there. Gambits bring you in positions that are rather unknown, basically that means that you have to see for yourself which moves are best. In order to do that, one must evaluate the position and think instead of following opening lines. In that case, gambits can be more learnful. I will make some evaluation of the Smith-Morra line, probably as well as the wing-gambit, since those have certain ideas that are not in the most lines I handed out so far. Things like offering for space and undermining the opponents center.. 

I don't think your blog is very useful in its current form -- it only has a few lines, no explanations. I think you can assume that even beginners can type 'sicilian defence' into Google and find Wikipedia's page ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sicilian_Defence ); wouldn't it be better to link to that, and then go into more detail or better explanations in your blog?

At least you stopped short of saying it's not useful at all. It sure fosters discussion, which is good. Unlike google or wikipedia, it's in a chess related environment with a chess playing audience, which is good. And frankly at my pathetic level of play, all the discussion that comes with many of the more detailed explanations confuse the issue for me.

I'd like something which 02Wesley was nice enough to provide (on his own time) but with just a suggestion of the objective or intended result. By "suggestion" I mean a few sentences. I'd like to get an idea of the BIG picture.

What is meant with '' the big picture '' ? I try my best to put annotations, ideas and thoughts about how a move is made, and I try to post some of the main plans and objectives in the openings. How other would you like to see the big picture? 

Sorry Wesley, "Big Picture" means what is the overall form or intention, not what are the details. Think of the difference of looking at Amsterdam from street level vs. from 10,000 meters above it. You don't see the street names or see the stores, but you see where it sits on the land and can maybe imagine why it's there.

Okay, I get what you mean.. But how exactly would I show you the big picture? Have you got some article or anything to show me some that does the big picture? It might be useful to try and adapt that in my blog, but I simply don't know how. Any Ideas anyone?

2: Nc6 - why? Here's an example - "Black intends to actively pursue the center. This will lead to a complicated center game."   (I have no idea why 2:Nc6 is played so ignore the actual description)

2: (or is it 3:) a6 (Najdorf): "Black wants to prevent white developing its Bishop on b5 and plans to play a passive defensive game."

I guess I imagine a brief statement of why the move is made followed by a statement about the type of play to expect as a result.

don't worry - You made a nice post.