Raymond Keene

Dark lord

issue 20 June 2015

A new book, Opening Repertoire: The Nimzo-Indian and Bogo-Indian by Christof Seilecki (Everyman Chess), focuses on the ever popular Nimzo-Indian and Bogo-Indian Defences. The former arises after 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 Bb4 while the latter commences 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e6 3 Nf3 Bb4+. The possibilities for transposition are legion.
 
The Nimzo-Indian is named after the subtle chessboard strategist and author of My System Aron Nimzowitsch, victor of the great international tournaments at Dresden 1926, London 1927 and Carlsbad 1929. Its close relative is named after Efim Bogolyubov who won the equally impressive tournaments at Moscow 1925 and Bad Kissingen 1928 and also challenged, unsuccessfully, for the World Championship in 1929 and 1934.
 
Opening Repertoire explains a dark square strategy for Black based on the pawn structure with … d6 and … e5.
 
Sergey Kasparov-Bologan: Minsk 2000; Nimzo-Indian Defence
 
1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 Nc6 3 Nf3 e6 4 Nc3 Bb4 5 Bd2 0-0 6 e3 d6 7 Bd3 e5 8 d5 Ne7 9 a3 Bxc3 10 Bxc3 b5 Black may also play slow moves like 10 … c6, instead of Bologan’s straightforward approach.







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