Two Knights' Defense 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5ch c6 7.dxc6 bxc6 8.Qf3!

8.Qf3 Be7 9.Bxc6 Nxc6 10.Qxc6 Bd7 11.Qc4 0-0 12.Nc3 Rc8 13.Qe2

And now Black should play
13....h6! with suficient compensation

A) 14.Nge4  Nxe4 15.Qxe4 Bc6= (Vouldis-Sheram, 2006)

B) 14.Nf3  e4!
  B1) 15.Ne4 Nxe4 16.Qxe4 Bb5! with (17...Re8 to follow) =/+ (Mas-Iuldachev, 2008)
  B2) 15.Ne5, Be6!= 16.b3?,Rxc3 -/+ (Sacharov-Bakhmatov,

I don't know as to whether bringing the queen out is a good idea. I am by no means an expert on the two knights' defense, nor do I have the latest theory on it.

But I think the original idea behind 8. Qf3!? was to try to make something of winning the c6-pawn as well, an idea that is now discredited and largely abandoned because it gives black a huge initiative.

Yes, the queen may be more active on f3/g3 than on d1, but she is also very vulnerable out there (getting pushed around), while black can hardly make a target of it while she's on d1. In addition you have to reckon with a possible attack on c2, which is now weak.

After studying the Two Knights' Defense with GM Alburt for 25 years (I acknowledged his role in playing one of the first games in the Fritz with 8.Nh3 instead of 8.Ne4 and called it the Alburt Variation after he played a game with it against Gulko; we analyzed the variation through the mail for months) for over some of the basic strategies are second nature; thus I would like to connect the dots to indicate why 8.Qf3 is better for White. Those of you who are so inclined can check the thread under 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Nxd5.

We have been told that: How is it possible that three "positional" moves in a row can lead to a winning edge for White 1...e5, 2...Nc6, 3...Nf6? Here is how. 

1...e5 weakens the f7 square more than any other move by Black. Name any of the remaining 19 moves that weakens the f7 square more. The f7 square is the weakest square in Black's position. 1...e5 creates a target in the form of the immediate hits either 2.Nf3 or f4, both of which are far less strong if there is no pawn on e5. Black can counterattack with either 2...Nf6 or 2...f5.

2...Nc6 hems in the c-pawn; maybe it is better not to play e5/Nc6 so that Black can instead play d5/Nd7/c5,

3...Nf6 blocks the Queen's communication with the g5 square, permitting 4.Ng5 A DEVELOPING MOVE; Black is under the threat of the immediate loss of material by the hit either 5.Bxf7ch or 5.Nxf7. 5...d5 forces Black to give up a pawn or face a powerful attack after 5...Nxd5.

Black can sacrifice material unsoundly in the Wilkes Barre/Traxler which has been dealt with in detail in two other threads.

4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 (A Knight on the rim is grim---look how long it takes for Black to bring this piece back into play) 6.Bb5ch c6 (Keeping the weak pawn on with 6...Bd7 will be discussed elsewhere)

7.dxc6 (eliminating a weakness) bxc6 8.Qf3!

Here are the reason why 8.Qf3 is superior to 8.Be2:

1)No post member has been able to show that Black can gain enough time against White's aggressive Queen maneuver to compensate for its greater activity on f3 rather than d1,

2)White prevents an open file that usually occurs when White plays 8.Be2 (8.Bd3 was discussed on the Fritz/Berliner post (?))h6 9.Nf3 e4 forcing White to go to the undesirable square e5 where Black can try either 10.Ne5 Bd6 with poor compensation for the pawn, or 10...Bc5 with better compensation for the pawn. In either case White is forced to give Black an extra open file after either 11.d4 or f4 followed by an e.p. capture,

3)White can keep the file closed by playing the Steinitz Defense 9.Nh3. Here are your options: You can have a Queen on f3, a Knight on g5, and a Bishop on e2, OR, You can have a Knight on h3, a Bishop on e2 and a Queen on d1. Which would you prefer?

4)Because of the Queen on f3, White can delay repositioning the Bishop for at least one move. The original idea to win a second pawn is a bad idea. Give Black one pawn and he doesn't have enough compensation for one pawn. Give him a second pawn and he has compensation for the two pawns because of superior piece activity,

5) 8...h6 can be met with the highly desirable 9.Ne4 so that Black can't play 9...Bg4 because 10.Nxf6ch wins a piece. You will note that 9.Ne4 is a DEVELOPING MOVE. 9.Nf3 is an UNDEVELOPING MOVE.

6)There has been no showing of any analysis to date that Black ever regains his gambit pawn in this variation. Has anyone who wants to play this position factored in all the hidden tempos Black has to use just to return his Queen Knight to a useful square? If Nc6/Na5/c5/Nc6, Black has spent four tempos to get the Knight to a square that it can access in one move from the starting position. Or Black can try Nc6/Na5/Nb6/Nc5 when the Knight can access the c5 square in two moves from the starting position i.e. Nd7/Nc5.

7)A recurring theme is to meet Nb4 with Bd1, A DEVELOPING MOVE, holding the c2 square and theatening to gain a tempo with a3 driving the Knight back to the d5 square when obviously Nd5/Nb4/Nd5 is a waste of time.

8)One of the tried and true observations of chess is that it is necessary to have a pawn's worth of compensation in an OPEN POSITION to justify a pawn sacrifice. Even with best play in the Fritz where Black gets four tempos for the pawn, it doesn't appear that Black equalizes. This is not all that surprising because in the Steinitz Variation, Black can easily have 4-5 tempos for the pawn and still stand worse.

Black has no targets to hit and gets nothing even close to four tempos for the pawn, particularly when you factor in that Black has to return the Queen Knight to a better square to make progress.No matter how you slice it, the Knight on the rim is, indeed, grim.

Why is it that with all those games supposedly in various data bases that no one has provided any games where Black does well? The only game provided so far was the game where former Correspondence World Champion Yakov Estrin in the game Estrin-Taimanov played the this sequence: 8.Nf3 h6 9.Ne4 Nd5 10.Nbc3??

Black has made three positional blunders:1)He trades Bishop for Knight after 10...cxb5 for no good reason, 2)He repairs Black's defective pawn structure after cxb5, 3)He deprives the King Knight of the c3 square. Thus it is important for White not to meet f5 with Ng3 because this encourages the pawn advance f4 at some point. Black's only hope in this position is a wholesale advance of his Kingside pawns. In another post I showed how these pawn pushes can leave Black with a static weakness to go with his pawn deficit.

It would be appreciated if post members would provide games where Black equalizes or stands better in the 8.Qf3 lines. Form where I stand most of the variations favor White and Black might get lucky in the 8...Be7 line to achieve an unclear position.

The Two Knight's Defense is a favorite of mine, but it is only recently I have ever been faced with this 8. Qf3 variation. With black I won against it against a low rated player but lost against it when it was played by master Eric Schiller. So for me the jury is still out on the variation. It is interesting though, and seems to take some of the steam out of Black's development advantage gained by the pawn sacrifice.

Please, stop this crap in the forums.  Just took a look at the chesspub forum posted by Conquiscador and got a chuckle out of that one.  My favorite part was sloughter lecturing a GM!

The Two Knights Defence is based on positional compensation like the Marshall Gambit in the Ruy Lopez.  Does being a pawn down in the Marshall lead to a forced loss as black? No and it does not happen in the Two Knights either.  The pawn difference allows black to get adequate activity.  If anything, it should be known as the Chigorian Counterattack.

"1...e5 weakens the f7 square more than any other move by Black. Name any of the remaining 19 moves that weakens the f7 square more. The f7 square is the weakest square in Black's position. 1...e5 creates a target in the form of the immediate hits either 2.Nf3 or f4, both of which are far less strong if there is no pawn on e5. Black can counterattack with either 2...Nf6 or 2...f5."

I cannot help but laugh at that statement.  I have heard beginners say the same theory.  1.e4 e5 is losing because of 2.Qh5 followed by 3.Bc4 and 4.Qxf7#  Then I proceed to win every time. That means that hundreds of GMs have blundered already on the first move!  Good thing the youngsters have learned this lesson.  Come on...the worst move is obviously 1.e4 f5? with the Fred Defence.

"thus I would like to connect the dots to indicate why 8.Qf3 is better for White. Those of you who are so inclined can check the thread under 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Nxd5."

I am not sure why the Fried Liver Attack has anything of relevance here.  It is already known as a weak move so you do not need to enlighten us of that.

"1)No post member has been able to show that Black can gain enough time against White's aggressive Queen maneuver to compensate for its greater activity on f3 rather than d1,"

Of all the analysis posted I see little fear from 8.Qf3.  It is a gimmick move that hopes for an advantage.  Sure the queen is at a more active location, but she is also more vulnerable.  If I remember correctly 8...Be7 equalized easily and you failed to prove an advantage from it.  In addition to 8...Be7 which you dismiss as unclear there is also 8...h6 which you have yet to show an advantage there either.  8...Rb8 is certainly possible although I think that the other two options look nicer.

"2)White prevents an open file that usually occurs when White plays 8.Be2 (8.Bd3 was discussed on the Fritz/Berliner post (?))h6 9.Nf3 e4 forcing White to go to the undesirable square e5 where Black can try either 10.Ne5 Bd6 with poor compensation for the pawn, or 10...Bc5 with better compensation for the pawn. In either case White is forced to give Black an extra open file after either 11.d4 or f4 followed by an e.p. capture,"

The main line of the Two Knights is very good for white.  White has a pawn more, no weaknesses in his position, and the pawn structure is much nicer thanBlack's. The open files are to White's advantage.  What should I fear coming down the ranks when I can simply move my rooks there?

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5+ c6 7.dxc6 bxc6 8.Be2 h6 9.Nf3 e4 10.Ne5 Bd6 11.d4 exd3 12.Nxd3 Qc7 13.b3 and I am quite happy as white.

"3)White can keep the file closed by playing the Steinitz Defense 9.Nh3. Here are your options: You can have a Queen on f3, a Knight on g5, and a Bishop on e2, OR, You can have a Knight on h3, a Bishop on e2 and a Queen on d1. Which would you prefer?"

The Steinitz Defence is rather ugly and not as sound.  Bobby Fischer played it once and won, but the opening is still suspect.  9...g5! leads to a black advantage.

"4)Because of the Queen on f3, White can delay repositioning the Bishop for at least one move. The original idea to win a second pawn is a bad idea. Give Black one pawn and he doesn't have enough compensation for one pawn. Give him a second pawn and he has compensation for the two pawns because of superior piece activity,"

The idea that you can delay a bishop retreat for a few moves is not very good.  White will at some point have to lose a tempo or two to retreat eventually.  The idea that it saves time goes out the window.  White loses further time with his queen being exposed.

"5) 8...h6 can be met with the highly desirable 9.Ne4 so that Black can't play 9...Bg4 because 10.Nxf6ch wins a piece. You will note that 9.Ne4 is a DEVELOPING MOVE. 9.Nf3 is an UNDEVELOPING MOVE."

The whole idea of retreating the knight to e4 instead of f3 is positionally wrong as well.  Why do you fear Bg4?  8.Be2 does not have that problem.  The knight will eventually retreat so you lose more time moving the knight than with 9.Nf3.  Anyways, where do you suggest the knight to retreat?  Nec3?  That is an extremely ugly move.  Your knights are bumping into each other.  So much for a better position.  Are you trying to tell me a knight at c3 is better than e5?  I do not find that highly desirable.  Undeveloping pieces does not make sense.  That would be retreating the knight back to g1.

"6)There has been no showing of any analysis to date that Black ever regains his gambit pawn in this variation. Has anyone who wants to play this position factored in all the hidden tempos Black has to use just to return his Queen Knight to a useful square? If Nc6/Na5/c5/Nc6, Black has spent four tempos to get the Knight to a square that it can access in one move from the starting position. Or Black can try Nc6/Na5/Nb6/Nc5 when the Knight can access the c5 square in two moves from the starting position i.e. Nd7/Nc5."

Talk about tempos, I do not think you know what a tempo is.  If I go by your theory than white has wasted at least six tempos, the knight to g5, to e4, to c3, than you have to spend time to retreat the bishop, you will have to spend time on the queen being attacked in the center, and you will lose even more time trying to develop your other knight, because you decided to put the king's knight there.  Black has more than enough time to get a good position.

"7)A recurring theme is to meet Nb4 with Bd1, A DEVELOPING MOVE, holding the c2 square and threatening to gain a tempo with a3 driving the Knight back to the d5 square when obviously Nd5/Nb4/Nd5 is a waste of time."

I do not know why black wants to ever go to b4 as it loses way to much time and it places Black's knight away from where it needs to go.  Black does not play for cheapo tactics!  For some reason you always say that black needs to play that move and it has been shown on all of your diagrams, the only place it isrecurring!

"8)One of the tried and true observations of chess is that it is necessary to have a pawn's worth of compensation in an OPEN POSITION to justify a pawn sacrifice. Even with best play in the Fritz where Black gets four tempos for the pawn, it doesn't appear that Black equalizes. This is not all that surprising because in the Steinitz Variation, Black can easily have 4-5 tempos for the pawn and still stand worse."

I still do not think you realize the idea of a tempo or the position.

"Black has no targets to hit and gets nothing even close to four tempos for the pawn, particularly when you factor in that Black has to return the Queen Knight to a better square to make progress.No matter how you slice it, the Knight on the rim is, indeed, grim."

It is clear what Black's targets are: White's kingside and queen.  White on the other hand is forced to sit back and defend.  By playing 8.Qf3, you give black a clear target and white really has no meaningful plan.

"Why is it that with all those games supposedly in various data bases that no one has provided any games where Black does well? The only game provided so far was the game where former Correspondence World Champion Yakov Estrin in the game Estrin-Taimanov played the this sequence: 8.Nf3 h6 9.Ne4 Nd5 10.Nbc3??"

Let me ask you a question.  Why do almost no GMs ever play 8.Qf3 and almost unaminously will choose 8.Be2?  That clearly shows the confidence they have in the individual variations.  White has not done very well otherwise this line would overtake 8.Be2 in popularity.

"Black has made three positional blunders:1)He trades Bishop for Knight after 10...cxb5 for no good reason, 2)He repairs Black's defective pawn structure after cxb5, 3)He deprives the King Knight of the c3 square. Thus it is important for White not to meet f5 with Ng3 because this encourages the pawn advance f4 at some point. Black's only hope in this position is a wholesale advance of his Kingside pawns. In another post I showed how these pawn pushes can leave Black with a static weakness to go with his pawn deficit."

I do not know what you are refering to here.

"It would be appreciated if post members would provide games where Black equalizes or stands better in the 8.Qf3 lines. Form where I stand most of the variations favor White and Black might get lucky in the 8...Be7 line to achieve an unclear position."

This has already been addressed.

Okay so you have still tried to refute every line by spending an hour with Fritz 8.  Rybka has already concluded that the opening is fine for black.  Rybka is much stronger than Fritz 8.

So after all your posts, you have yet to prove anything.  Are you preaching to the choir?  What are you selling here because I am not buying. 

Your arguments are like broken pencils, pointless.

Here is the link for anyone interested in the story.

http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1230634273/0

Yes, I read pages of that without getting bored.

There is only one variation except such things that are obviously losing here where White should play 9.Bxc6ch: 8.Qf3 Bd6? 9.Bxchch+- or 8.Qf3 Be6? 9.Bxc6ch +-

Black is a tempo down over the main lines with 8.Qf3 Bg4

Slougtherchess! You again! You did not learnt much since the chesspub story. I am happy that you have changed your mind about the Ulvestad line but you have not learnt much about the 5..Na5 and 8.Qf3 line. Do you remember I equalized really easily against you with 8..h6 and even had the advantage easily with 8..Be7 against you? What is your improvment since that story? At the time someone said and in that forum conquiscador said the same about your only one good contribution: the 8.Nf3 in the Traxler which is not easy to improve for Black. But despite that, everything has been said about you.

I've enjoyed following this sloughterchess-v-rest-of-the-world match. Such enthusiasm!

One of the rumors is that Black can equalize after 8.Qf3 Be7 but a key idea in this position is simply 9.Nc3! taking advantage of the pin. Here is what it looks like in practice.

In that line, doesn't black get a good game with 10. ..h6 11. Ne4 and now the typical Nd5 followed by Nb4 (or maybe Nf4) and Nxd3, wrecking the white pawn structure, which can be followed up by Ba6 etc, and if the white bishop moves then c2 is hanging ?
Or can white play 11. h4 or something? It looks fishy to me after 11. ..Nd5.

White can improve:

Long analysis=bad analysis

A 36 move line does not help us with going through theory.  Over 50% of that line is useless for the overall theory of the line.  If it takes that long to prove white is doing well, then there is likely many errors an room for improvement for black, and black in reality has equality.

Sloughter, you give one line of analysis each time and conclude that black is lost without looking at the alternatives for black.  You are the refuter!  It is your job to prove your point, just like a lawyer would at a court case. 

Please visit the chesspub topic you made which includes the exact same analysis you used here and it was shown multiple times that your lines were faulty.  You might find all the improvements we gave there.  In 27 pages you were unable to prove that your variation was any threat to black.

You just posted 36 moves into an opening that you claim has been summarily dismissed and therefore underanalyzed.

Let me repeat, you posted THIRTY-SIX moves in an underanalyzed opening. I know next to nothing about this defense, but I can still smell the bullshit in your posts.

Sorry Sloughter, 36 moves of useless analysis. First, tell me what is the point of having the queen on f3 if it is to play Bd3 while Black did not any defensive move to Qf3? If you really want to play like this, 8.Bd3 may be the best (and this is maybe the real search for a small advantage) And then: 11.Nh3?! (11.Nge4 was still ok) 11..Re8!, a flexible and developping move putting pressure with the ..e4 threat while giving the possibility of having the e7 bishop in a defensive position in f8( and g7) which may be important after a move like ..g5! exploiting the bad position of the Nh3 and Qf3. For exemple 11.Nh3?! Re8! 12.0-0 g5! and White is not good. But I know I am losing my time again with you. You are really stubborn in the wrong way and I know you will come again and again...

To my critics. You don't seem to understand that the whole point of White's play is to deny Black an extra open file that he gets in the 8.Be2 variations

. He is willing to distort his position just to keep the position closed. Despite all your posturing, I see only one new move of analysis 11...Re8 which I will address here.