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Chessville
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SOS - Secrets of Opening Surprises Reviewed by Jens Madsen
New in Chess (NiC) magazine is indisputably one of the finest chess periodicals in the world. The eight yearly magazine issues are brimming with contributions from the crème de la crème of the chess world. The same can be said about the quarterly NiC Yearbooks, which distill opening theory developments for a target audience consisting of stronger tournament players. Finally, in recent years our Dutch chessfriends seem to have increased their efforts to publish more English-language books. Quite a number of these titles are spun off from articles in the NiC magazine, for instance Russian Silhouettes and The Reliable Past; Genna Sosonko’s two fine books with his memoirs of great chess personalities from the past.
Look at your opponent sitting there in blissful ignorance. Fully at ease, everything under control, not a worry in the world. Or so he thinks. He’s checked his repertoire, double-checked his main lines. He wanted to come well-prepared and he did. Or did he? Because what he doesn’t know is that today is not his day. For the simple reason that he’s playing you. And you are going to spring a surprise on him. No main variations today, nothing mainstream, he’s going to be initiated into a world of secrets: Secrets of Opening Surprises! The book contains 18 surprising ideas in a great variety of openings, so that there is almost certainly something to complement any repertoire. Most chapters are constructed around one stem game with meticulous annotations to consider most sensible deviations. Based on Bosch’s postscript, there does not seem to have been an urgent need to rework much of his original analysis. Compared with the contents of the magazine articles, only minor textual changes were made and recent games, played in the period between the publication of the original New in Chess article and the book, have been added. It bodes well for the quality of Bosch’s analysis that many of the recent games are from the hands of respected grandmasters. A very nice thing about SOS – Secrets of Opening Surprises is the completeness of Bosch’s coverage. Accomplishing this in the restricted space of five to ten pages is a far from trivial task. Obviously, the reader should do further homework on these lines before trying them out over the board, but it seems to me that Bosch does a good job of anticipating likely replies. It is appropriate to give a small example of this thoroughness. In Chapter 14 (Only Mad Dogs and Englishmen?), we are treated with the SOS antidote to being bored to death in the Reti (1.Nf3), namely the baffling retort 1…b5. Like so many other unorthodox opening ideas, this move apparently has a following among English players (hence the chapter title). To whet our appetite (for destruction?), Bosch starts by showing a game where Julian Hodgson plays Black in this line and performs a 20-move assassination. In another game we see Peter Svidler facing off as Black against former world championship candidate Mark Taimanov.
In both of these games, White chose setups including e3 and d4. However, Bosch considers 1.Nf3 b5 2.e4 Bb7 3.Bxb5 to be the critical test of this line, and so pays considerable attention to this reply. There is also about half a page of analysis that covers systems with White kingside fianchetto (2.g3). When I first looked at 1.Nf3 b5, my immediate reaction from White’s perspective was to continue the festivities with the flick-of-the-wrist move 2.a4!? Of course, I did not really expect Bosch to take this move too seriously, and so it was a pleasant surprise to see him mentioning not only this move but also other White oddities such as 2.b3 and 2.c3. The format of the two final chapters is quite different from the rest of the book. Rather than NiC magazine articles, these two chapters were based on theoretical reviews that Bosch did for the NiC Yearbooks. One review dealt with the French Wing gambit after 1.e4 e6 2.Nf3 d5 3.e5 c5 4.b4!, while two other reviews covered the Kupreichik Sicilian that arises from 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Bd7!? Incidentally these chapters, both 30 to 40 pages long, are the only ones that seem to have undergone a substantial analytical update. A large part of these chapters consist of what I would be forced to characterize as a database dump of relevant games for further study. The analysis itself is definitely more thorough here, but I must admit that in my eyes these two chapters were the weakest part of an otherwise fine book. Once more, I am not disputing the value of Bosch’s analysis, but rather saying that I preferred the concept reflected in the rest of the book – a brief and easily understood introduction to an opening surprise. I think it is fair to judge a book of this sort in large part by the merit of the surprise ideas it presents. Obviously, Bosch’s opening idea will take you to largely uncharted territory, where the ultimate verdict is not yet clear. However, it seems safe enough to say that most of the 18 ideas presented in SOS – Secrets of Opening Surprises appear to be fundamentally sound (I have my personal doubt about the soundness of the abovementioned the French Wing Gambit though.) As I already mentioned, many grandmasters have already showed that they are willing to rely on Bosch’s ideas. Let us look at an impressive application of one of Bosch’s ideas, namely a game from the 2004 Aeroflot Open in which 13-year-old GM-elect Magnus Carlsen manhandles the otherwise rock-solid grandmaster Sergei Dolmatov. The game features the improved Lisitsin gambit against the Dutch, an idea that Bosch treats in Chapter 16 of SOS – Secrets of Opening Surprises. Carlsen,M - Dolmatov,S
Dolmatov is a well-known proponent of the Dutch, so our young hero must have known exactly what to prepare for. Considering his age, Magnus has a very versatile opening repertoire, but seeing that 1.Nf3 is a rarity one is left with the impression that Dolmatov inadvertently stepped straight into a minefield. 1.Nf3 f5 2.d3!? This is the subtle “SOS” move, which is an attempt to improve on the Lisitsin gambit that is characterized by the immediate 2.e4!? 2…d6 3.e4 e5 4.Nc3 Nc6 5.exf5 Bxf5 6.d4 Nxd4
Here Dolmatov deviates from the stem game used by Bosch. In that game, Krasenkov-Kindermann 2001, play continued 6...Nb4 7.Bb5+ c6 8.Ba4 e4 9.Ng5 d5 10.f3 exf3 11.0-0 with an edge for White. In his book, Bosch also includes two recent games featuring 6…e4 7.Nh4, which is a continuation that looks very comfortable for White. 7.Nxd4 exd4 8.Qxd4 Nf6 9.Bc4! Here Carlsen improves on the calmer 9.Bd3 Bxd3 10.Qxd3 c6 11.0–0 Be7= Romanishin-Malaniuk, Tallinn 1987, which is mentioned by Bosch. 9...c6 10.Bg5 b5 After 10...d5, White is better after 11.0–0–0! Be7 12.Qe5. 11.Bb3 Be7 12.0–0–0 Qd7 13.Rhe1 Kd8?! Not a fun position facing from the Black side. White has a vast advantage in development, and after the text move the end arrives surprisingly fast. Queen-side castling might have provided a triffle tougher resistance, but very likely the game was already lost! 13...0–0–0 14.g4! Bxg4 15.Rxe7 Qxe7 16.Qxg4+.
14.Rxe7!! This totally pulls the chair off from under Black's position. 14...Qxe7 Or 14...Kxe7 15.Bxf6+ gxf6 16.Re1+ Kd8 17.Qxf6+ Kc7 18.Re7 and game over. 15.Qf4! Bd7 16.Ne4 d5 17.Nxf6 h6 18.Bh4 g5 19.Qd4 1–0 Oh boy!!
As an interesting innovation in chess publishing, New in Chess is offering a prize of 250Euros, which will be awarded to the best new game featuring an SOS-idea! The Carlsen brilliancy above should be a strong candidate, but I would not let it discourage you from entering the competition. You have to act quickly though; you must send in your entry before September 1, 2004! Most players,
from an intermediate level and up, should be able to find at least a couple
fun ideas in SOS – Secrets of Opening
Surprises
to incorporate into their armory. You could bring the book to your next long
tournament if you feel like trying out some new ideas.
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The
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SOS – Secrets of Opening
Surprises collects the writings of strong Dutch IM Jeroen Bosch, taken
from his identically named columns in the NiC magazine. Each installment of
Bosch’s column presents an intriguing opening idea, which is designed to
throw your opponent off balance early on. Here is what the back cover blurb
says:
