Evans Gambit game

I don't think 7.0-0 is "better" having now studied 7.Qb3 and of course our Greek comrade prefers the latter

One possible reason may be the 7...Qe7 reply from black. However I've played both variations with success, but that may be the reason.

Ah fair enough, I thought you were still advocating it.

Another interesting game with 7.Qb3 is Molner-Bartholomew at Copper State Int'l 2010. Gives an example of White winning with this against strong opposition anyway!

http://chesstempo.com/gamedb/game/2821579

Qe7 is actually inferior to the move played in the game because it puts the queen on the same diagonal as the bishop after a later Ba3 and can cause problems with castling. The knight is better on e7, blocking the diagonal than f6 .

Agree Scottrf, Qf6 is stronger - probably Bartholomew decided he didn't know the line that well. A practical advantage of the Evans (and another reason to favour OTB chess over correspondence!)

Haven't put it through a computer yet, but just wondering what was best on move 9 here (and any improvements elsewhere). Obviously I'd like to save that bishop but retreating to c4 allows Na5.

http://www.chess.com/echess/game?id=63734482

6...d6 is a mistake (6...Na5).

7...Qd7? is a genuine lemon, and 9.Bxg8 does not look bad, but I'd rather develop (9.Nbd2 or 9.0-0). White looks being much, much better.

Thanks. Yeah, Na5 seems a lot more challenging. With the pawn back, a good centre, easier development and a breezy black king white seems to be doing well here. Disappointingly I missed quite a few tactics, although some of them were complications I felt unnecessary (23. Bg5 doesn't make a lot of practical sense to me).

I got to try out pfren's suggestion - though it's a shame the game didn't last a bit longer!

is it too early to play 19. d6??? I think opening the c file for your highly mobile rooke and queen would be better considering cxe5  Nxd5...

Would it be fair to say that switching back to 7.0-0 didn't help very much?

Seriously though, I'm still not convinced either about 7.Qb3, but haven't got the aptitude for further analysis.

Won a 45|45 game using the Evans - in a slightly different line (the one where Black takes 2 pawns (a la Fine) then gives up the bishop pair and tries to defend. It wasn't a quick knockout but I thought I played quite well - combined different ideas from this thread with Qc1 featuring, and also as padman suggested building up the pressure in the centre more slowly rather than trying to force things - worked out nicely! Might turn this into a Evans Gambit games thread - other people feel free to post too.

The main inaccuracies for White that I've already noted are 20.Re4 not being so great (20...Na5 seems to counter it quite well) and for some reason not playing 34.Ra4. I'm not even sure Qc1 was best in this specific position but I don't think it was bad with the idea of bringing the queen to f4.