Question on French Defense Advance Variation with 6...Qb6

I don't know why anyone would be afraid of the gambit lines in the Advance. If I could have that position as black in every game, I'd be very, very happy. All you have to know is a little theory and it helps to have some practice in the line. But in general, ThrillerFan is right: all the alternatives to 6. a3 are bad, and black is at least equal and possibly better (especially if white gambits a pawn). To be fair, though, the Advance is obviously not the acid test of the French Defense, and will never be considered as testing as 3. Nc3, for obvious reasons. 

Well, firstly, conceptually it is a bit flawed. It releases the pressure too early without forcing a concession first, like winning the dark bishop in the Winawer or forcing Nfd7+being able to play f4 in the Classical Steinitz.

And if you need other reasons, just check out the statistics and the number of GM-level players who play the Advance as opposed to Nc3. You'll find a trend.

The d4 square is an outpost for the white knight. Remember, to have a strong center, the center doesn't have to be filled by pawns. 

By high level, I mean a level at which the players with black would likely have any serious preparation against this gambit. Many of the games I found showed black playing cluelessly, and when Melekhina played this in the U.S. Women's Championship a few times, her success (if you can call it that- she got good positions out of the opening and then often blew those games) was mainly due to those opponents being surprised by the gambit and not having (serious) prep against it. Actually some of the opponents, like Foisor, even admitted to that. 

If any of the white advocates of this line tried it against a French-playing GM with a lot of experience, even someone like Var Akobian, I doubt they'd come out alive. There's a reason we don't see this gambit in GM vs GM games in the French. The line I gave above in response to the 9. Nbd2 Gambit borders on a "refutation", and there may also be reason to look into the Bc5 lines as well if, for whatever reason, you're not satisfied with that. All in all, I have no faith in this gambit as anything more than a complete surprise weapon, and if black is prepared, you should be worse as far as I know. Maybe an improvement will be found upon the analysis I have done, but that remains to be seen.

I like your analysis dpnorman.

Actually, Once I looked over your set of moves.

I was curious!

I was wondering about alternative moves at move 11.

After looking at the set of moves you played.

I was doubting the useful-ness of the move 11.Be3.

White gains a tempo on the black queen.

However, It doesn't seem like the tempo gain hurts black any sort of way.

When you think about it 11.Be3 is driving the black queen to c7 were it more than likely wants to go to attack e5 any way.

What if white instead plays 11.Bf4 overprotecting the e5 pawn?

Maybe this will be an interesting alternative.

@X_PLAYER_JX I think that's not much of an improvement over the mainline. After 11...Ng6 12. Bg3, the bishop's more or less out of the game, and after 12. Be3, we have a tempo-down version of my mainline for white.

True!

However, I would like to argue black's knight on g6 doesn't look inspiring.

Maybe white can try to get the knight on g6 to move or cause black to make a weakness.

For example:

What if white plays the pawn move h4 with the idea of playing h5 moving the knight away from g6.

At which point white can always reposition the bishop on g3 to e3.

If white plays h4 and black responses with h5 trying to prevent white from playing h5.

Maybe white can try to target the h5 pawn.

If white is successful in winning the h5 pawn he will no longer be a pawn down.

But with ...Be7 and the knight already on g6, it's hard to see how white defends the h-pawn. Actually, he's going to have a harder time defending both e5 and h4 than black will defending h5, since black's rook is on h8 at the moment, whereas white has already castled. Black can also play with ...Nb4, harassing the white LSB. There doesn't seem to be any meaningful practice at a high level after Bf4, but engines (and simple logic) seem to show that playing in this fashion should also lead to a significant disadvantage, and that's not an acceptable outcome for white in the opening.

Well I am not saying white should play h4 right away.

White could make several preparational moves first.

I would probably play Rc1 first.

Rc1 puts the rook on a1 on open file.

If white plays Rc1 than white can always answer Nb4 moves with Bb1 with out having to worry about the rook being trapped in the corner on a1.

Once white has Rc1 done they can play moves like Re1 to over protect the e5 pawn.

Eventually black will more than likely castle by that time.

Once black castles white might try to throw up the H pawn at that time.

I think the pawn move h4 + h5 would be a nice long term plan for white.

When you look at the white position.

It doesn't seem like white will be able to play f4 + f5.

If white moves the knight on f3 they would more than likely lose the e5 pawn.

Furthermore, It doesn't seem like white should play on the queen side since the majority of white's piece are in the center + king side.

White needs a pawn break for some play.

The only pawn break I can see is with the H pawn

In the end, it's a sort-of-normal position, except white's just down a pawn. That's the long and short of it, and I don't want to play such a line for white. 

Please look at this - My own blog on this gambit!

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 c5 4. c3 Nc6 5. Nf3 Qb6 6. Bd3 cxd4 7. 0-0 is very strong for white

Anyone who would like to understand OP's variation should being with visiting Nimzowitsch's My System, where is is dealt with in the beginning. 7.dxc5! is Nimzowitschs move. White's plan is to dominate the centre, not by pawns, but by pieces!