French Powerbook 2016

For the French Powerbook we once again used above all high grade material: “only” just 20 000 games from Mega and from correspondence chess, but these are of high quality. Added to that are 235 000 games from the engine room on playchess.com. The statistics of points scored mostly does not look too good for Black, but there is a simple reason for that: the engines which were playing with the white pieces had on average higher Elo ratings. But when one looks at the performances scored, remarkable variations can be found and the book turns out to be a real treasure trove. For example in the main variation of the Steinitz 4.e5 Nfd7 5.f4 c5 6.c3 Nc6 7.Be3 cxd4 8.Nxd4 Qb6 9.Qd2 Qxb2 10.Rb1 Qa3 11.Bb5 Nxd4 12.Bxd4

The trend in modern chess has for a long time been to 12...a6 13.Bxd7+ Bxd7 14.Rb3 Qe7 15.Rxb7. The important question is then: does Black play 15...Qd8 or 15...Qh4+? But recently theory has been coming up with a totally different reply: 15...Rc8. The almost 4000 games in the Powerbook can provide important evidence for the evaluation of the position, since for White there are hardly any alternatives available on the long route towards this position.