„Easy to learn and easy to play.“ These are the twin pillars on which the Modern Scandinavian has been built and which club players have trusted and profited from over the past few decades. Which line should Black adopt after 1 e4 d5 2 exd5 Qxd5 3 Nc3? Here we focus on the sharp 3...Qd6 as opposed to 3...Qa5 or 3... Qd8. All the main responses aside from 3 Nc3 are shown in exemplary games and the result is an insightful overview for club players which will stand the test of time and not require too much burning of the midnight oil. Instead of learning every move by heart, the author focus on showing model games which will explain the plans and ideas the Scandinavian with 3...Qd6 has to offer.
The Scandinavian is a practical opening. You can use this to your advantage. Two helpful tools will help you get this exciting opening into your opening practice. You can practice the variations with the ChessBase Opening Trainer. Drilling the opening moves, guessing how a position arose or just replay the moves in your desired speed further reveal the ideas this opening has to offer. Playing out positions against Fritz will further enable you understand the ideas the author presented in his videos.
The Caro-Kann Defence is named after the English chess master Horatio Caro (1862–1920) who lived in Berlin and the Austrian player Marcus Kann (1820–1886). However, the move 1...c6 was not particularly popular until the 1920s, when both Jose Raul Capablanca and Aaron Nimzowitsch took up the opening. When, in 1960/61, Botvinnik was looking for a reliable defence for his WCh matches against the feared sacrificial attacks of Mihail Tal, he chose the Caro-Kann. Tigran Petrosian and Anatoly Karpov were two other world champions who adopted 1...c6 in their repertoires.
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