QPG: Trompowsky Exchange Question

QPG: Trompowsky Exchange:

What do U prefer 3...exf6 or 3...gxf6 ?!? or what is better in your opinion ?!?

3...exf6 is more sound and more solid.  Only time I might suggest 3...gxf6 is if you are in a final round, must win situation with Black and a draw is as good as a loss.  Otherwise, not worth the risk.

All right, thanks for this insight!

g....keep it simple.

3 Bxf6 gxf6 4 e3 c5

3 e3 c5 4 Bxf6 gxf6.

There isn't much to love about gxf6. The King's bishop hasn't a great place to go to, castling is complicated and delayed, all for the sake of a center pawn. The opening is a race for development, but gxf6 does not appear to help that objective.

3...gxf6 is the soundest and more frequent recapture by quite a margin.

The reason is quite simple: Black will be able to chip at white's center with ...c5 without being saddled with an IQP.

(Magnus played 3.e3 first, but this is just a transposition).

2...d5(!) is the simplest and most direct way to equalize against the Trompowsky, and  Black need not know much of theoretical lines to employ it.

A very recent game Cramling-Wenjun (September, 2019), 0-1, where black played 3. gxf6:

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1972105

Yes, WCh. Ju Wenjun employed the same simple+safe strategy Karjakin used against WCh. Carlsen.

Good explanation!

e takes without doubt. There is no justification in this position for gxf6, which does nothing for black's development and which creates weaknesses.

(The position given by pfren is not the position given in the O.P. I should have thought that would be obvious)

It is the same- just a brief move order change: 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 d5 3.Bxf6 gxf6 4.e3 c5 is the Carlsen- Karjakin game.

Can you suggest something else than 4.e3?

4.Nc3 c5 is a very common Veresov line, and 4.c4 dxc4 is just fine for Black.

The position given was before white played c4, however. I know, yes, you're right, it would transpose to a Veresov-Richter with ...c5 and that is and has been commonly played by GMs but back in the day I did an awful lot of work on the Veresov, looking at it from the black side and I came to the conclusion that although ...c5 is perfectly playable, I much preferred ...Nd7 followed by ...c6, which can be far more aggressive from black than the ...c5 lines, where it is black who comes under pressure. I didn't think black really got enough for the weaknesses incurred although I accept that in the hands of a master who is more tactically proficient than I am, black should manage to draw. But I was always looking for the really aggressive, surprise lines, so I was playing Tal's sacrifice back in the days when most GMs seemed to be claiming that it was unsound and they would never play it. It isn't unsound. Hence my prejudice away from the ....c5 lines. I think black is really just attempting to neutralise white in those lines.

Obviously, in the line I mentioned, white doesn't exchange on f6 after Nbd7 has been played and black doesn't play h6 because he wants the B on g5 to pin white's e pawn.

The ...Nbd7 line in the Veresov is too safe, I guess- Black has few practical chances to press for a win.

I recently played this game against a lower rated opponent. I played all the natural opening moves, but sadly enough there was not much left to play about... White played passively nd Black could get something tangible a few moves before the end, but it was far from easy/obvious.

Oh right, yes, the Veresov main line with 4. f3 is pretty much out of fashion although back in the early 90s, it was more common than 4. Nf3. I agree that if white doesn't push too hard and plays 4. Nf3, it's harder for black. I still preferred c6 in that line though, and no immediate h6. Maybe then, black can play Ne4, although it isn't a line I studied because most people played f3. But Nf3 is solid for white and it's a war of attrition usually. Maybe ...g6 is possible, like in the Caro-Kann where white plays Nc3 rather than Nd2 and black reasons that makes the a1-h8 diagonal more vulnerable than with Nd2.

In the game you show, could you have played 10. ...g5 followed by ...Nh5 if you had really needed to win? I don't think white has any immediate attack at that stage so it might have been ok and then you would have had b8 available for your R and you could play ...b5 eventually.The way you played it just looks a little too solid and I expect you were counting on the ability that comes with 200 grading points difference to provide the win.

Panagiotis - Panayotis, when I glanced, I thought that U played with your younger brother.

Same Christian name, but registered differently at FIDE, since there is no commonly accepted way to write it down. There is no equivalent name in English, the closest one being Marion.