Optimal Sicilian styles for low ELO

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Avatar of Demondeath1

Good morning,

I tend to play the Caro or Scandinavian for defense. I tried playing some Sicilians a few days ago and lost 4/5 games. I believe it was the old Sicilian and Dragon variations I tried.

What other Sicilian styles may be good for me to try?

Avatar of blueemu
Demondeath1 wrote:

Good morning,

I tend to play the Caro or Scandinavian for defense. I tried playing some Sicilians a few days ago and lost 4/5 games. I believe it was the old Sicilian and Dragon variations I tried.

What other Sicilian styles may be good for me to try?

I always relied on the Najdorf, with a Scheveningen-like center formation.

I first started playing it back in the early 1970s, and I've stuck with it ever since.

Avatar of tygxc

@1

"the Caro or Scandinavian for defense" ++ Both are good. Pick one, ditch the other.

"I tried playing some Sicilians a few days ago and lost 4/5 games" ++ Each time you switch openings, you lose more. It takes time and losses to accumulate experience.

Avatar of blueemu
tygxc wrote:

Each time you switch openings, you lose more. It takes time and losses to accumulate experience.

Each time you switch openings you LEARN more.

A new opening system gives you valuable experience with new types of central formations, new middle-game plans, a new pattern of key squares.

You cannot become a good chess player without leaving your comfort zone.

Some distinction should be made between advice that helps a low-ranking player beat some of his equals (your advice), and advice that enables a low-ranking player to become a middle-ranking player instead... on his way to becoming a high-ranking player (my advice).

Avatar of MaetsNori
Demondeath1 wrote:

Good morning,

I tend to play the Caro or Scandinavian for defense. I tried playing some Sicilians a few days ago and lost 4/5 games. I believe it was the old Sicilian and Dragon variations I tried.

What other Sicilian styles may be good for me to try?

You played it only 5 games. It takes a lot more practice to become proficient in a new defense. Dozens of games, at the very least. Hundreds? Even better!

Imagine a toddler trying to walk for the first time - and he falls down 5 times. Then the parent says, "Well, that's clearly not working. Maybe walking isn't for him?" tongue.png

Avatar of Demondeath1

I appreciate all the comments, thank you!

Avatar of King_Devzev

YOUR DOING FINE

Avatar of GooseChess

There's a saying I've heard that you shouldn't play the Sicilian below 2000 Elo. i think it's only slightly hyperbole. If you find the Sicilian fun, or highly tactical games are to your advantage, just ensure you know the ideas of a few responses. The Alapin and Grand Prix are two I play as white and it's very obvious when black doesn't know the ideas because they get stomped.

Avatar of Strayaningen
GooseChess wrote:

There's a saying I've heard that you shouldn't play the Sicilian below 2000 Elo. i think it's only slightly hyperbole. If you find the Sicilian fun, or highly tactical games are to your advantage, just ensure you know the ideas of a few responses. The Alapin and Grand Prix are two I play as white and it's very obvious when black doesn't know the ideas because they get stomped.

I think the Sicilian is fine for beginners. If I look at 1200 level on Lichess (equals about 900 here) the Alapin is seen 4% of the time. The Grand Prix proper less than 1%. The McDonnell Attack (the immediate f4) another 3%. If you play these openings and observe that Black doesn't know what to do it might seem to you this is a big problem, but it really isn't.

For OP, the question of which Sicilian you play is irrelevant at your level, you should not even bother knowing the names of the variations. I wrote a quickstarter here for beginners, just follow that. You should just try out different development schemes and see what works well for you. Your opponents are not going to have any idea how to play against the Sicilian.

Avatar of GooseChess
Strayaningen wrote:

I think the Sicilian is fine for beginners. If I look at 1200 level on Lichess (equals about 900 here) the Alapin is seen 4% of the time. The Grand Prix proper less than 1%. The McDonnell Attack (the immediate f4) another 3%. If you play these openings and observe that Black doesn't know what to do it might seem to you this is a big problem, but it really isn't.

For OP, the question of which Sicilian you play is irrelevant at your level, you should not even bother knowing the names of the variations. I wrote a quickstarter here for beginners, just follow that. You should just try out different development schemes and see what works well for you. Your opponents are not going to have any idea how to play against the Sicilian.

Wow I didn't know those were so uncommon at those levels. I'm around 1800 Lichess so maybe the opening meta is different for me than OP. I definitely agree with your second paragraph that opening variations is not that important for OP to improve.

Avatar of Strayaningen

At Lichess 1800 Alapin 6%, Grand Prix 2%, McDonnell 6%. It is kind of surprising, I feel like you see the Alapin get discussed online way out of proportion to how much it actually gets played. I'd probably nominate it as the opening with the biggest disparity in that regard, actually.

Some chance chesscom has bigger numbers than that, I feel like Lichess has a userbase of people more inclined to play "proper chess", but as someone who has recently switched to the Sicilian and has been playing on here, 6% seems right to me. I've seen the Alapin like one time. The delayed Alapin a couple more times.

Avatar of GooseChess
Strayaningen wrote:

At Lichess 1800 Alapin 6%, Grand Prix 2%, McDonnell 6%. It is kind of surprising, I feel like you see the Alapin get discussed online way out of proportion to how much it actually gets played. I'd probably nominate it as the opening with the biggest disparity in that regard, actually.

Some chance chesscom has bigger numbers than that, I feel like Lichess has a userbase of people more inclined to play "proper chess", but as someone who has recently switched to the Sicilian and has been playing on here, 6% seems right to me. I've seen the Alapin like one time. The delayed Alapin a couple more times.

I used to play the Alapin, but switched to the Grand Prix because it's more fun. I did win more with the Alapin and have been thinking of going back, feels like every Sicilian I've faced recently knows the theory.

Avatar of blueemu

I've always enjoyed the main lines.

Me vs B. Cosman, Saint John Summer Open (OTB), June 1981.