Enjoy!

What a coincidence! I just made a video on the MacCutcheon Variation! Just kidding, but wouldn't that have been funny!

I'll have to give this line a look as I play Nc3 (just can't seem to get a grip on the Tarrasch). It's either this line or bribe my opponent with a few bucks before the game to play something other than the French... Zibbit would be a rich man if we were to play

Another nice video.

On the videogate scandal 'imitation is the sincerest form of flattery...' or '...if things didn't just happen it would be quite a coincidence.'

I don't know if requests are acceptable but a video on 3.Nd2 would brighten my week!

Hi Floop, I think I have already made videos with 3.Nd2 although there is more to come. I thought this game was pretty interesting because of the rupture g4 with two black pawns being controlling that square, esthetically it was impressive to my eye.

The funny thing is the day after I recorded and analyzed this game, I went to play the last round with my team in Valencia's team Championship, facing an IM and I got to play the same kind of rupture, I played e3-e4 with black pawns on d5 and f5, it was a pretty good feeling of dejavu.

I had the game published on my blog http://renierchess.blogspot.com
The direct link is http://renierchess.blogspot.com/2011/03 ... lysis.html

You can also download the chessbase file from the page ''Chess Archives'' above
And by the way it's a game with 3.Nd2 so if you haven't checked it, it may make your week

Best regards
Renier
http://renierchess.blogspot.com

Just looked at that game, 21. e4 was a way cool move, of course the Qf2 move is what set things up. Well played game.

That game was more than just deja-vu, it was deja-vu I'm crushin' you!

Hi,

Thanks for the leads and references. I'll follow them up now - unfortunately my mother died recently - so please excuse me if I have seemed rude in not thanking you for your kind response to my enquiry.

I'm very sorry to hear that, no problems mate.

Take care

Renier
http://renierchess.blogspot.com

I had the game published on my blog http://renierchess.blogspot.com
The direct link is http://renierchess.blogspot.com/2011/03 ... lysis.html

Thanks for the above.

Increasingly I've been drawn towards playing the French as a main 'weapon' against against 1.e4 and, although I'm more than capable of losing games in any line, I have to say that 3.Nd2 causes me more pain than most (though I'm also not wild about giving up the centre with dxe as per the Rubinstein, so the MacCutcheon is definitely of interest!).

In part 3.Nd2 inspires a sinking feeling because I lack a certain 'faith' in black's pawn structure in the main line after 3...Nf6 following ...cd and ...f6. Maybe faith isn't the right word (ability! is probably more accurate) but after some effort I'm reduced to admitting that so far I just 'don't get' what I 'don't get' about this structure. It seems something of an uphill struggle for black to get equality.

So I'm definitely attracted to alternatives to 3...Nf6 but haven't really settled on anything. I've looked a bit at ...Be7 and ...c5: and at ...a6 and ...h6 in John Watson's Dangerous Weapons book. I'm going to have to try and settle down to something over the summer.

Anyway - your game with 3...a6. Very enjoyable (for white). I'm not sure about my level of understanding but black seemed drawn into creating a lot of potential weaknesses on the dark squares all over the place - c5 being the icing on a fairly substantial kind of cake. In this context giving up the dark-squared bishop must have been an unpleasant decision/error of judgement? The central break was nice - and I'm not taking anything away from it because 'you' had to see it -but black was really 'asking' for it!

After that, well there isn't much to say except well played!