English Chess Forum

Hi All,

I have been experimenting with the London System recently, however I am by no means well versed yet.

I recently came up against a move not covered by Nigel Davies in his DVD or my rather old book (apologies in advance, I still haven’t learned to put the moves on a computer board):

1.d4, Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.Bf4 and then 3…Nh5

Now looking at it, it seems a fairly obvious move and must have occurred in a lot of games. Though there isn’t a lot on 365 chess (I think 5 games, all draws or wins for black).

In the game I decided I didn’t want to play Bg3 right away and allow black to snap off the Bishop for nothing, so I chose 4.Be5 more or less forcing the move 4…f3 and only then, having provoked a weakness, did I play 5.Bg3 and seed the Bishop pair in return for a weakened black Kingside and an open Rook file. I later castled long and went for the Kingside, but the game was drawn.

Is this the right way to go about things? Or am I missing some well-known piece of analysis?

I'd probably just play 4.Bg5, and I don't think black's achieved anything by moving his knight slightly offside.

IM Jack Rudd wrote:I'd probably just play 4.Bg5, and I don't think black's achieved anything by moving his knight slightly offside.

It's a possible transposition to a Torre with a tempo loss. Here's how Hort and Fischer handled a Torre back in 1970 (that enormous Blitz tournament in Yugoslavia)

1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 g6 3. Bg5 h6 4. Bh4 Bg7 5. Nbd2 g5 6. Bg3 Nh5

and as a plausible alternative to reach the some position, but Black to move.

1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 g6 3. Bf4 Nh5 4. Bg5 h6 5. Bh4 Bg7 6. Nbd2 g5 7. Bg3


4. Bd2 is another move. An early Nh5 is usually possible in London systems. That's why in some move orders, h3 is played early on to enable the Bishop to drop back to h2. It's possible that White just wants to provoke g5.

Hi Jack and Roger I looked at Bg5, but aren’t I just allowing black lots of tempo pushing the Kingside pawns forward to kick the Bishop? h6 and g5 then the Knight will take the Bishop anyway, solving the offside Knight and relieving me of my two Bishops.

Did I want to provoke the move g5? I wasn’t sure maybe if black had castled. Think the grading differences are showing here, in terms of positional judgment

Swapping the bishop off anyway? I'm not letting him do that. If he plays 4...h6, I'm going 5.Bd2.

IM Jack Rudd wrote:If he plays 4...h6, I'm going 5.Bd2.

Transpositions everywhere. I found a game from a German Girls' under 14 which went

1.d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 g6 3. Bf4 Nh5 4. Bg5 h6 5. Bd2 d5 6. e3 Bg7 7. c4 c6 8. Nc3 Nf6 9. Be2 0-0 10. 0-0

which transposed to a Ray Keene game from 1979 which had gone

1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Nf3 g6 5. e3 Bg7 6. Be2 0-0 7. 0-0 h6 8. Bd2

In the Keene game, the idea of 7. .. h6 had been to follow up with 8. .. Be6 in order to provoke 9. cxd5. In the German game, Black went for a conventional liquidation with 10. .. dxc4

I think that Nh5 changes the nature of the position and would thus consider Be3 to avoid being kicked around.

I’ve since had the same thing crop up in a CC game since - I went for Jack’s Bg5 idea but didn’t like the look of those games where Bd2 and e3 is played, so I opted for going e4, my opponent played c5 and exchanged on d4, so I’m currenty trying to manoeuvre things into a Sicilian Dragon Yugoslav attack type thing, where my opponent has wasted time with his Knight and me with the Bishop. I can see nothing more useful for his Knight now except to head back to f6, and I’ve got ample time to get f3 in and start the kingside attack

I would aim for a Barry Attack against the KID.

It worked for Hebden against Nunn ... twice!

Brian Towers wrote:I would aim for a Barry Attack against the KID.

It worked for Hebden against Nunn ... twice!

It hasn’t worked for me very much though, I think I’ve managed 1 draw in the 7 or so games I’ve played it

I’ve recently being looking at the Veresov attack Vs 1…Nf6 though. If black insists on a KID with 2…g6 a quick e4 will “trick” him into a 150 attack vs the Pirc which I am much more comfortable playing.