Game of the Week: A fascinating approach against the Sicilian

by Merijn van Delft
3/17/2021 – This week Merijn van Delft takes a look at the relatively new and highly fascinating 7.g4 variation that Grandelius came up with against the Sicilian. | Merijn's show is available at 16.00 UTC (17:00 CET, 12:00 EDT) and on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.
The most popular chess program offers you everything you will need as a dedicated chess enthusiast, with innovative training methods for amateurs and professionals alike.

Game of the Week #455

Online top level chess is back with the tournament that started it all — the Magnus Carlsen Invitational.

The preliminaries were exciting as usual, with Tata Steel winner Jorden van Foreest making his debut. The other newcomer, Alan Pichot, actually had a rough ride with his favourite Taimanov Sicilian. While Carlsen was successful with the Fianchetto Variation, Nakamura and Nepomniachtchi won their games with the 7.Qf3 main line.

We will study the relatively new and highly fascinating 7.g4 variation that Swedish GM Nils Grandelius came up with.

Warm-up question: What would you play here with White?

 
N. Grandelius - A. Pichot, 2021
Position after 8...dxc6

When it comes to strategy, one of the key things that chess professionals understand much better than amateur players is the role of the bishop which is the key theme on this video course.

This week’s show

The continuous stream of new ideas in the Sicilian makes 1..c5 the most popular answer to 1.e4. On this DVD I do give an introduction to the most important Sicilian systems.

Watch previous shows

Recent shows

Many more Game of the Week shows are available in ChessBase Videos

Links

Merijn van Delft is an International Master from the Netherlands who lived in Hamburg for many years and is currently based in Amsterdam. After scoring a GM norm in 2017 he is eager for more. His ChessBase show on Wednesday evenings has been running for over ten years now.

Discuss

Rules for reader comments

 
 

Not registered yet? Register

We use cookies and comparable technologies to provide certain functions, to improve the user experience and to offer interest-oriented content. Depending on their intended use, analysis cookies and marketing cookies may be used in addition to technically required cookies. Here you can make detailed settings or revoke your consent (if necessary partially) with effect for the future. Further information can be found in our data protection declaration.