Ranking the Top 5 Openings (for Black) for Club/Pro Players (feat. GM Perelshteyn) | DojoTalks
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- Опубліковано 19 чер 2024
- GM Eugene Perelshteyn joins the Dojo to rank the top five openings for Black against 1.e4 and 1.d4, for both Club and professional players.
(0:00) - Intro/metrics/opening discussion
(15:00) - Openings for Professional Players against 1.e4
(30:20) - Openings for Club Players against 1.e4
(49:40) - Openings for Professional Players against 1.d4
(1:01:30) - Openings for Club Players against 1.d4
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I can tell you my experience as a club level player. Against another player with similar skill the opening doesn't matter much. We both screw it up. Against a player significantly better than me then it matters a lot. I fall into way too many traps or just get a horrible position and get slaughtered. However, if I play a "system" type of opening then I can at least get into the middlegame before I get slaughtered. Plus, and this is huge, I only have so much time to study, and devoting that time to tactics and endgames is FAR more beneficial.
This was a lot of fun, thanks Eugene for joining us!
Only now i've realized you have another channel on UA-cam, that's why i wasn't subscribed yet...thanks for your work, you make a lot of interesting content!
@@andreitiberiovicgazdovici thanks!
Funny watching this 3 years later and hearing all the references to Nepo's dynamic repertoire, compared to the Petroff and semi-Tarrasch machine now!
Great info! Thanks for the help. This is my favorite chess channel.
Great job !
The most interesting and instructive chess material in Yotube, hands down! Thank you for the great work!
Thanks! 😊
I have been learning nimzo and I like that many positions White can just drift into equal material but strategically lost position with any lazy moves. Their pawn structure is so bad. The pressure seems to be on white to produce something or suffer. Their light square bishop can often be made into pawn and if black achieves pawn on e4 white knight is also often useless.
Very interesting!
The trouble with the Sicilian as a club player is that there are so many other line. Smith Morra, grand prix, Aladin, Rossolimo and so on
Very enjoyable. Great to have a chess broadcast to ‘listen’ to, I don’t always have the time to stay focused on the screen. Also, I’m an adult improver (1200). Openings that tend to get me into a game and give me a decent position and fighting chance, especially against stronger players, are KIA as white, and KID, Alekhine and Pirc as black. Spent some time learning the BD gambit as white, but always get thrashed by stronger players!
Have you heard of Perpetual Chess podcast? They do an episode very week with great players or improves and sometimes big figures. For example, my favourite episode was with Boris Gelfand, and they've done one with Kostya, Sam Shankland, Jacob Aagaard and a bunch of others, over 200 episodes. You can find it on Spotify, iTunes or UA-cam if you search perpetual chess podcast. They ahev a series for adult improvement, I recommend Andras Toth because that was just amazing for chess improvement
When you get a bit higher rated the stronger players will start mating you every game in pirc with just h4-h5 in many different dangerous setups. I played 8000+ games pirc and think it’s objectively bad for anyone except pros. You must have strong dynamic skills or will just run out of space and lose.
@@zwebzz9685 very interesting. My comment was from 9 months ago and I’ve since abandoned the pirc!! Played a correspondence game (one white, one black) against a very strong player, who happened to be a coach too - I tried the pirc and lost in 14 moves. He said exactly what you said, only for professionals! As even with extremely precise moves, you will struggle to get anything more than equality!
Hey! Great video! Can anyone explain why the queens gambit and nimzo are preferred over the semi-Slav?
This was good for me also thanks I really appreciate the video right ok bye🥰
In my onion, practising openings is good. But, studying the end game, practising tactics with puzzles and applying the main chess principles as much as possible and playing rapid and classical is, by far, the most effective at beginner level.
I have tried different openings and the more I study openings the more I lose. I mean what's the pont in getting a wining position in the opening if you can not convert it in the middle and end game.
This matches with our overall philosophy! We don't recommend any opening study for beginners
I really like this episode but I think it's not available on apple podcasts (at least I can't find it there). Any chance it could be made available so I can listen offline?
Why GM Kraai was against the Caro-kann? Especially to a peasent like me (1700)
Also, on the idea of banking on the Benko, White can choose to *not* advance to d5 and play may transpose to an Accelerated Dragon Maroczy Bind.
Good point but Black should have options to avoid the Maroczy
Club Players have limited study time.
The advantage lies in openings you can force upon your opponent so you can stay in Book while they are out of book.
You’d be surprised how many games at club I win playing the Chigorin Defense.
Following this concept, openings/defenses that you can force and are good:
1. Scandinavian
2. Dutch
3. Petroff
Etc
As White the GPA, Bishop’s Opening, Panov Attack, Monte Carlo, etc
Easy to learn. Easy to force upon your opponent for consistency.
For this reason I play the Grand Prix Attack. All my club opponents are clueless against it because they spent all their study time on open Sicilian lines.
You have to fall in love with your opening!
Dojo, I was playing around with different openings until I met a gentleman at the St.Louis Chess Club that had been playing the French for 30 years. That inspired me to dive deep into an opening. Since the pandemic started I have fallen in love with the Catalan( which wasn’t mentioned in this video) and the KID. I really love the positions I get and have really improved tremendously with these openings. I am still figuring out which e5 openings and responses!
Did the match mentioned at the end ever happen?
I've been getting a few lessons lately and my coach has suggested Kostya's top choices for E4 and D4. Dragon & KID. These will be my very first openings to learn for black. It's interesting observing how my mind reacts to trainings when before I loved being free and never knowing what move would be next. Now having a plan changes everything. Where I hope to improve most is time management, as previously my move accuracy was generally more than satisfactory.
I think David's suggestion would be better if he said to taste them all and get a feel for what you like. Then focus on one and master is as best you can before moving on to the next. I think the most important lesson is to begin with the end in mind. More experienced players will understand what I mean there.
I think KID can be tricky as a club level player. It's a great weapon to play for a win but white has so many different good setups to challenge you. I really like the QGD and classical openings that fight for the centre with pawns. QGD in particular seems to have a reputation as unambitious but I've had some really fun attacking games where both sides have chances and you just have to outplay your opponent. I also like French against 1. E4. The pawn structures in these openings are very useful to understand for long term improvement imo
Eugene is "The Man."
But as a player seeking long term growth, and positions that match my style, I play Caro-Kann, Nimzo/Ragozin complex in OTB 90+30 events.
I’m kind of confused what they mean by playing space.. I mean I know what space is but it sounds like the implication is that more space is hard to play than less
For the Caro for the pros, do you mean the Tartakower or the Classical?
Gurgenidze: 1...g6 2...Bg7 3...c6 & 4...d5
The Rat: 1...g6 2...Bg7 & 3...d6 (1970s name, esp. Canadian: see p.14 of Botterill/Keene book on the Modern)
But as Ludwig W insists, the meaning is the use, so this feels like picking an argument that I have already lost...
This was very interesting... but where is the companion video for white? Maybe doesn't make sense because it is black that "chooses" the opening. Would love to see a version of this ranking the "system" openings: KIA, Botvinnik, Colle, Larsen/Zukertort etc.
The h4 line he mentioned in advanced caro is by far my highest scoring opening as white. Players up to 2200 don’t seem to know what to do and I win a lot of games with the exact same tactics.
Yep. I use it in blitz and the most common continuation I face is ...h5, 5.Bd3 Bxd3 6. Qxd3 e6 7. Bg5 Qb6 where I usually get in a quick c4 and black has a hard time completing development. I switched to the Short variation as I think black can equalize against h4 with some good prep, while it would be harder for someone to prep an adequate defense to Nf3 Be2. I also feel like I don’t want to change my line against the caro once I hit 2200ish
@@xerograv6375 thank you. If I ever I hit 2200ish (fide) I will be picking up d4 using my coaches prep and using all my self prep 1. e4 from last 6 years blitz as surprise weapons. It will be a while though because currently prioritizing new black openings and nimzo is a lot.
Super-helpful and interesting: thanks very much to everyone. ... Question: Since the time this video was made, has anyone changed or updated their recommendations?
So when you say play them all, David, how long would you play them for? Switch every x games and just rotate e5, c5, c6 etc?
Hi can someone explain the Kan 45:24 ? It's not the Caro-Kann, correct?
Kan is a Sicilian that has e6 on move 2 and then a6 on move 4. Very flexible for black.
Iam surprised that no one mentioned the classical sicilian as weopon,IMO it is not as bad practically as the dragon and not heavy theoritically as the najdorf and still gives good attacking chances and covers most of the themes of the sicilian like the rook sac,c line,b5 pawn sac etc.
I think that if white plays the Rauzer or Sozin, black really just gets a weaker version of those lines than in the Najdorf which are already dynamically balanced anyways.
@@xerograv6375 Still the yugoslav is more venomous and straightforward for white than the Rauzer ...if u like playing against the yugoslav Rauzer must be ur cup of tea
@@venkateshs7027 the English attack is basically a forced draw but black is mcuh more flexible and has more optikns
As far as I know, the classical is fine too. I would slightly prefer the sicilian options I mentioned, but not by miles.
Everytime I rewatch this video i pickup something new.
Hi guys, great video, but one thing is bothering me, I cant understand why would you recommend KID for peasant but not for pro?? As far as i know, KID is one of most respectable opening and one of the biggest, if not the biggest out there(followed with Grunfeld, Najdorf..). So first thing enormous memorization is required cause it has more side mainlines(Sameich, Classical, 4 pawns, Fianchetto, Averbach...), 2nd thing you really need to be good player or let's say to have good general knowledge(2200+FIDE) to play KID successfully. For example, I am probably a player around 2000+ strength, and I really liked KID(Mar de Plata mainline), and played it some time online... but I gave it up cause those sidelines were too much to deal with and I felt in a lot of those sidelines, I am misunderstanding positions and I am not good enough to understand those ideas if I didn't see them before (so if you want to play it, without knowing everything, I think you have to be good players to find those key ideas in key moments). I understand that KID is easy for first 6-7 moves, and that's why you may be recommending it, to lower rated players but after that, KID is anything but not easy!! Also would like to mention you have to know at least 3 pawn structures if you wanna play KID good (e5-d6-c7/Benoni/Benko).For me kinda huge disagreement on that one, all other suggestions were fine and on point I would say, really liked the discussion on various choices. Keep it up!!
Thanks for your comment! Nowadays although the King's Indian has shown to be playable at the top level, very few players make it their main repertoire. The likely reason is that it's not considered as solid as other defenses to d4.
At lower levels, we believe there is more upside to the King's Indian, so it's worth playing for the attacking chances.
Hope that makes sense!
And also when is the openings for white
Fun video! Surprised to see the Marshall Defense ranked so highly - my most successful attempts with it always transpose into some variation of the Grünfeld Defence! Thanks everyone for sharing your thoughts!
They mean the Marshall attack- a line in the Rudy Lopez.
Too bad that Jesse Kraai's opinions were not depicted on the grid. I care about his opinions most.
thanks! I mostly concur with their list, decided not to opine simply because I don't see a big diff in opening choices between club and prof players
Why were the Najdorf and Sveshnikov universally favored over the Taimanov? I thought the Taimanov is also regarded to be fine for Black. Also, why doesn’t Jesse like the Caro-Kann?
Jesse really likes space. The Taimanov is also very solid, idk why they didn't put it in
But how can we define the "best" openings without taking into account the style and strength and weaknesses of the player, either peasant or pro? Big gap for me is a black answer against the Catalan.
These are just our general recommendations. Of course the right opening depends on the player 😊
Who is the strongest player on the list?
For David's discussion, around the 6 minute mark, on short term vs long term improvement, how long is "long term" improvement? Like 1 year? 5 years? or what?
forever :) What I am imagining is a goal of maximizing your eventual maximum playing strength.
Is the acc dragon really that practical to play for amateurs? I always thought playing against the Maroczy bind is kind of hard.
If you know the structure and your opponent has no clue, on the beginner level you are going to win every game
@@stanleytime9193 Lol if I was going to win every game if I know the opening better than my opponent than I would study openings all day!
Next guess, Yermo plz make it happen!
Guest I ment.
Author's name is Kotronias in case you're here looking ;) Go Mitch!!
I Always loved Kasparov's style, but the reality is that "my style"🤣(probably i don't even have "a style"...) Is Much Much more like Karpov's, and Always was...slow, Boring, positional chess, for me a GG Is in an 70-80 move endgame... What i want to Say Is that i agree with you, i tried aggressive openings, but It just didn't worked for me. I got better when i Stuck to my beloved slow, positional, defensive openings
@@tiagomoraes1510 as a white player I go for the Ruy Lopez, if they play the Sicilian I play the Canal Sokolsky Attack (or the Moscow variation, It depends on the move order, if they try the Caro Kann I play the Panov-Botvinnik variant, for the French I play the advanced french. As a black player I used to play French against 1.e4 (at the time of my comment), now I play Sicilian Kan/Taimanov, against Queen's Gambit I'm currently studying the Albin Countergambit (Morozevich's games)
@@tiagomoraes1510 Ruy Lopez can be very tactical, it is true, but in the main line it is often very positional and strategically slow; also, I know the Ruy Lopez very well, but at my level (1700-1800 online), I almost never reach the main line (and when I did in the 3 minute blitz a couple of times I beat 2200-2280 elo opponents). But at 1800, 80% play the Steinitz variants, the Classical, the Berlin (by pure chance, as they have no idea of its complex theory) or even worse the Philidor... there is very little tactic to calculate in these variants
Would there be a difference between a 10-year-old improving 1600 player and a 30+-year-old improving player as far as opening advice goes? Surprised I didn't see the Tarrasch Defense vs d4.
Why were you surprised? The tarrasch has always been in the dubious category. It gained some popularity when Kasparov was playing it, but quickly went down again.
@@juyifan7933 The Tarrasch and semi-Tarrasch are 100% fine for either side up to 2200 level or maybe a bit higher. What matters up to 2200 is activity rather than Grandmaster level soundness.
@@musicalneptunian yes and the dubov tarrasch is fresh and good.
Not sure the Tarrasch is universally good for everybody, but my feeling is the opening choice matters little in the end - Kostya
@@musicalneptunian Up to 2200 literaly anything is playable. But if we are discussing openings from an objective standpoint the tarrasch is a second or third tier opening. The semi-tarrasch nowadays fares better and is used up to the super GM level, but of course it doesnt have the same reputation as the QGD or the nimzo.
can you do one where offbeat openings...work?
Great video but my OCD is triggered by the different font sizes and margin alignments. 😬
I'm going to get it right the next time!
Was there ever a sequel to this for white openings?
Yes! Check out the Openings playlist on our channel
Not seeing it
Title this for Openings for Black?
good catch
b6 is great for club players. even at the 1800 level, you will very rarely get more than 6-8 moves of a theoretical response
what about the french?!
Surprised that at the Pro level, nobody picked the Petroff.
In which my openings as Black (Pirc/Old Benoni) are ignored or considered terrible. Le sigh.
Oops!
This was a very class conscious discussion, but half-hearted. The gentry ought to have no qualms about calling themselves the Lords and Masters if they properly compare themselves to the mean plebs and peasants. Surely what is good for the nobler oughtn’t be good for the lesser. But when you fancy yourself “pro”, we look to the “amateur” for his opposite, rather than a dirty pleb or proletarian. Men well read in philosophy must be keenly aware of such categories, even as the Lords & Masters of mankind shan’t hesitate to affirm their Lordship as against the common vermin. As an amateur I am hopeful that I am not peasant vermin, but at least petty bourgeois. 😅
either "petty bourgeois" is a funny joke or you mean "petite bourgeoisie"...
Video on white?
Yes we have one!
@@ChessDojo awesome! It's "1.e4! According to the dojo"?
Play them all ! ! 😂 dude just berried his opinion
Let me preface this by stating I am a class C player. I play the English Botvinnik for white and e6 for black. Then either Classical Dutch or French.
I have to only partly agree with David on the play all the opening. I think that will work to understand what they might like while young. As an adult improve I have to disagree with this.
As to the mention of how many rating points you could gain from an opening repertoire I think there is big value here. Let me explain. I recently came back to OTB. Found I was a more positional minded player, hence the openings above. I have been following Ginger GM style of training. The only training I have been doing is Tactics, 7 Circles from Rapid Chess Improvement book and opening prep from chessable courses in those openings. With that being said the opening training is more on ideas and plans rather than memorizing lines. I have stuck to only those openings and tactics for the last 3 months. I initally took a dip in my rating from 1450 > 1344 since my return to OTB.
With that being said I can say there is huge benefit from sticking to limited openings. Now I think most of my improvement has come from tactics of course but what I will say is I feel much more comfortable in the positions I am seeing. I am getting used to these style of game play and what might arise. And with that comfort allows for risk taking and sometimes only solid play since I have a feel and a sense for the position as I have gained experience in these openings. My last performance took my rating from 1344 > 1496 in 4 weeks in my latest tournament at my local club. It we was met with many comments of wow you are so underrated or you are certainly a class B player.
What I am trying to say here is my experience I believe is a combination of everything you all were talking about. A healthy mix. I think when young you need to experiment and learn all the openings like David said to at least understand the basics and types of positions and pawn structures you may enter. Then as you grow into a longer term club player like myself specializing and using a more focused approach is a great idea. Love these discussions and chats. Looking forward to seeing what you all say for White. Keep up the great work.
no french ??
Keep that bishop open!
Why not the french
No space, bad bishop! Jesse likes it though :)
@@ChessDojo He prefers the french over the Caro-kann?? I did not understand his reasons against the Caro-kann
I am with David on this , play everything
I feel sad because Jesse doesn’t like the caro:(
I should have such a video 20 years ago, it would save me a lot of time. I don’t think it is great to play all openings, you will not really understand anything deeply. Opening is a great opportunity to study chess in a systematic way, and this means you should stick to one opening to have to time to learn and and learn from your games.
Those are some pretty shocking choices against e4 for club players by Eugene. Najdorf and Acc. Dragon are theoretical beasts and the Scandi, Lion and Rat are just bad. Even John Bartholomew doesn't recommend his students play the Scandi and any opening named after an animal is well known to suck. Maybe he thought he was rating the absolute worst openings?
Kind of hard to believe that many Grandmasters would play openings that are "just bad", isn't it? Perhaps there is more depth to the game than you think? Why would Carlsen play the Scandi in the Olympiad (one of the most important tournaments a player can play) if it was "just bad"?
Nothing wrong with the Najdorf/Accelerated Dragon! But perhaps you know better than the GM !
@@ChessDojo You Made A Fair Point, Openings Are Like Weird? Jumgle, So If Your Measerment Can Be Scewed If U Think Of An Opening That Is Bad As A Small Ant And Good Openings Like The Najdorf Are Like Cheetas from objective stand point there are some weird stuff out there that Can Poke A Hole On That Arguement, Such There Is A Secret Backdoor To Marshall Attack, which is seen as T-Rex nowadays from scandi which an ant-size opening or alakhine which is a beetle sized openings , So I Think U Can't Be Shallow About These Stuff Cuz U Might Get Blown Off The Board On A T-Rex Middlegame Arised From An Ant Opening Like Scandi, And that my friend is called the waepon of obscurity which magnus intends by playing it to give a serious blow phsychologically to the up coming opponents when they ask themselfs - if he beat that guy from a transposition with a scandi opening to marshall idk what in store for Me which already put them on a back foot while they prep against him , At Last I Wanted To Say to the guy who rised this issue is chess is really complecated game And u cant get away with making sweeping judgement about someone's opening or chess personality as u get away with judgment in real life sir .
Peasants 😂😂😂😂😂
As the Little Dragon famously said, he didn't fear the man who practiced 10,000 kicks once, but the man who practiced one kick 10,000 times.
Why have superficial knowledge of all openings in chess when you can pinpoint the ones that suit your style, personality, strengths, and weaknesses?
Another point to consider is that everyone is wired differently. Some people enjoy variety and diversifying their skillset, often because doing the same thing over and over bores them and because they believe in that approach on a philosophical level to some extent.
So forcing such people to play just one opening will make them quit chess because they'll constantly be pulled towards trying different and new things whereas those who enjoy perfecting and min-maxing would feel annoyed and inefficient if they had to learn bits and pieces of all the openings.
As someone has nicely pointed out already - when you aren't as familiar with an opening, you'll be dead in ten moves against a strong player. The only time half-assing an opening works at a club level is when you're both winging it or you are much stronger than your opponent and can open with literally any move or troll idea and then just slowly outplay them.
I enjoy positional system openings that don't leave much room for 100 different gambits you have to know or you're dead. Does that hurt my tactical development? Most definitely. Does that hurt my theoretical knowledge and ability to adapt to sharper lines when the games call for it? Absolutely. There are lines in the London that lead to an improved Scotch gambit and such that I don't take advantage of because I'm trying to keep the game in the spirit of the cozy London.
I have almost no knowledge of any e4 gambits and such and would get demolished by lower rated players who cheese with them. But give me my familiar structures and now I can make a decent player work for his meal.
Kids have more time and capacity to absorb information. So it makes sense to encourage them to try different things.
For adults, time and efficiency matter. You need to identify your goals and work on them because you don't have ten years to play wild gambits just to prepare you for the next 10+ years of chess career as a positional player who can sprinkle in that info from childhood when needed.
I play the London and Caro-Kann & Semi-Slav and have so much more to learn there that it makes no sense to start learning other openings in-depth that don't occur in my games. I'm vaguely familiar with them, but that's it. For example, I need to know the Benoni structures even though I don't play Benoni as Black but do face it as White when forced out of the standard London lines.
My logic is that I'll take on new openings when I know ~15 moves of precise theory for every line in my main repertoire. Until then, I ain't got time to memorize theory for new openings nor am I forced to do it.
Returning back to specialists vs. jack-of-all-trades, you can see it at a Super GM level also. There are players who specialize in one opening. Likewise, they are familiar with other openings to the extent they need to be. They apply the same logic and division of labor as a specialist at a club level.
So ultimately, the answer to this topic comes down to the person. Someone will thrive playing as few openings as possible, another person playing as many openings as possible.
Each individual has to try different openings and find his or her home.
And no matter what we think is the best approach, it's important to not go to the extreme - if you believe in learning many openings, you should still spend some time in specializing, and vice versa.
P.S. Kostya pointed out another important aspect to also pick openings that will help you learn middle games.
Likewise, Pruess made a good point about picking openings that make you face your weaknesses, but he needs to take into account we need to primarily work on what we enjoy to maintain interest in chess - who'd want to play openings he hates for years just to have a more complete chess game down the road, especially if you need to spend a ton of energy on learning theory for those openings.
And Jesse made a fair point about playing openings with more space being challenging.
dutch against d4 😂
but many Grandmasters could be called plebs because they don't have education or money or respectable job
What a lousy statement, "play them all"?
No, all defenses suggested by Eugene have animal names (humans are also animals in a zoological sense, right?).
Scandi is probably an animal, perhaps a small insect still unknown by scientists.
Its very boring when you obscure the view of the people the whole talk.
Different openings for pros and peasants sounds very condescending!
You forgot the Alekhine!