Grob VS King's Fianchetto

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Drake123lol

Why is the Grob worse than the King's Fianchetto? Like at least the Grob occupies the center and lets the bishop fianchetto at the same time, but somehow the King's Fianchetto is better. Am I missing something? We can also see this with the Nimzowitsch-Larsen Attack vs the Polish Opening.

PawnTsunami

The Grob does not occupy the center.  The push to g4 weakens the kingside (making castling there risky) while neglecting any development on the queenside (meaning castling there will take longer), so the king is basically stuck in the center with targets on the kingside that require further weakening moves to defend (i.e. h3 or g5+h4).

g3 leaves the pawn defended without massively weakening the kingside so it is possible to castle kingside.

The Nimzo-Larsen and Orangutan claim space on the queenside.  This neglects the center and kingside, but does not weaken the position so White can still castle kingside safely in most lines.

In short, the main problem with the Grob (and similarly with 1. f3) is it critically weakens squares on the kingside with nothing in return.

Drake123lol
PawnTsunami wrote:

The Grob does not occupy the center.  The push to g4 weakens the kingside (making castling there risky) while neglecting any development on the queenside (meaning castling there will take longer), so the king is basically stuck in the center with targets on the kingside that require further weakening moves to defend (i.e. h3 or g5+h4).

g3 leaves the pawn defended without massively weakening the kingside so it is possible to castle kingside.

The Nimzo-Larsen and Orangutan claim space on the queenside.  This neglects the center and kingside, but does not weaken the position so White can still castle kingside safely in most lines.

In short, the main problem with the Grob (and similarly with 1. f3) is it critically weakens squares on the kingside with nothing in return.

Oh so you mean it's undefended and it weakens the kingside like the Barnes?
oke thx man

PawnTsunami
Drake123lol wrote:

Oh so you mean it's undefended and it weakens the kingside like the Barnes?
oke thx man

Basically.  Here is an example to show the point.

White has overextended his kingside (castling there will be suicide) and is at least 4 moves from castling queenside while his kingside is getting ready to be shredded.  In fact, if you put this position into the engine, White is close to losing on move 3.  Granted, there is still a lot of work to do, but White has to play like an engine from here just to get back to equality.

Drake123lol
PawnTsunami wrote:
Drake123lol wrote:

Oh so you mean it's undefended and it weakens the kingside like the Barnes?
oke thx man

Basically.  Here is an example to show the point.

White has overextended his kingside (castling there will be suicide) and is at least 4 moves from castling queenside while his kingside is getting ready to be shredded.  In fact, if you put this position into the engine, White is close to losing on move 3.  Granted, there is still a lot of work to do, but White has to play like an engine from here just to get back to equality.

btw when i said it controls the center i was messing up the grob with the bird

KostasPap007

cool