Playing against the Queen's Indian as White

I won the bet!!  I won the bet!  I just knew that ghost_of_pushwood would respond to my to my comment #134, lol.

What's the Cleve-Indian?

Also for those of you who were confused about Nimzo-Indian variations: these are the main ones:

4. e3 Rubinstein (*there is a variation of the Rubinstein, called the Classical Rubinstein)

4. Qc2 Capablanca/Classical

4. f3 *there is no widely accepted name for this as far as I know

4. a3 Samisch

4. Nf3 Kasparov

and then the minor ones

4. Bg5 Leningrad

4. g3 Romanishin

4. Qb3 Spielmann

Guys, the great debate:

Is this a part of the Queen's Indian or Nimzo Indian?

the chess.com engine classifies it as a part of the Nimzo, but some authors have put it in the Queen's Indian or even the Nimzo/Queen's hybrid

I mean if this is a well known line of the Nimzo:

then why isn't the above a Nimzo as well?

What about the RagaNimzo then...? Or the NoNimzo. Probably best for lesser players.

what are those

So RagaNimzo is hybrid of Ragozin and Nimzo. And NoNimzo mean you don't play any Nimzo?

It is both. You can play NID with Nf3 or QID allowing Nc3 Bb4. It is usually covered in both type of books. I don't decide, it is a perfect hybrid.

And can you say why Bogo is not very popular at high level? 

I can. It's relatively weak .... black doesn't double white's pawns but still loses the better bishop. Also the c8 bishop can be more difficult than in QI.

You can't call the Bogo-Indian weak. Players like Petrosian and Smyslov have advocated it, playing it commonly.

There is no difficulty developing the c8 bishop: you can play ...b6 and ...Bb7 in QID style.

Also there are some Nimzo variations (like the Capablanca variation 4. Qc2) where Black gives up the bishop pair without inflicting double pawns on white, and still has plenty of good counterplay. This is the same in the Bogo lines with 4. Nbd2.

Although the Bogo isn't weak, it is less "threatening" for White  as there is no risk of doubled c-pawns. However, it is extremely solid. Black develops quickly, castles kingside, and plays d6 and e5, setting up a solid center but conceding a slight space advantage to White. The resulting positions often are similar to the King's Indian Defense, but Black does not have the passive dark squared bishop on g7. In the main line, Black also banks on the fact that White's knight on d2 is misplaced and the bishop on g2 is not active.

The main advantage of the Bogo-Indian over the QID is that Black has a lot of variations that he can employ. Although they don't necessarily give White a headache or problematic position, White needs to be familiar with them.

For example, in the 4. Bd2 line, Black has a lot of responses:

4... Qe7

4... Be7

4... Bxd2+

4... a5

4... c5

All these responses offer something for Black, for example, the pawn moves give him dynamic play on the queenside, especially when White plays Bxb4, the pawn will prevent the b1-knight from developing.

In the 4... Bxd2+ line, the c8-bishop gets developed on a6 and often traded off with White's good f1-bishop.

In the 4... Be7 line you will often transpose to Queen's Gambit Declined positions where White's extra tempo is useless, as the bishop is better on c1 than on d2.

The Blumenfeld is, if memory serves, a cross between a Modern Benoni and a Benko. So it can go 1.d4 ...Nf6 2.c4. ...e6 3.Nf3 ...c5 4.d5 ...b5 or some such permutation of those moves that arrives at the same result. And yes, although someone here doesn't think so, it's refuted. A GM who wrote a book a few decades ago thought so at any rate and I looked at the moves and indeed I thought it refuted, although I invented a positional pawn sacrifice for white that does the job even more convincingly so I used to play it and win that way. I haven't seen the Blumenfeld for years and I'm sure it would be played if it were actually sound.

But I just did call it weak. Perhaps it should have been a shouldn't? However, Petrosian and Smyslov predated the GMs who called it weak. Naturally I can't think for myself and only reiterate what GMs said, subsequently to Petrosian and Smyslov playing it.


It looks fine to trade Bishops after c5 because then black's c-pawn is sidelined and can no longer challenge white's centre. White doesn't need to play a3 and can simply develop the N via d2, as in the queen's gambit accepted when black has a pawn on b4. Against ...a5 I would suggest that white does not swap but plays Nc3. The idea would be to show that a5 isn't useful.

Yes, it's relative to sound openings. Some people like to be slightly worse if it's also off-beat.

But Petrosian and Smyslov? were world champion... So Bogo must be good.

And the hairy Greek master guy... said the Blumenfeld thing was good.

No, not at all. The better a player is, the more he is able to use a slightly sub-standard opening. This is actually a reason why there are bad continuations given or represented as good by the modern breed of tactical player.