Don't Play An Early ...Bf5 Vs. The Queen's Gambit!
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Don't Play An Early ...Bf5 Vs. The Queen's Gambit!
The Queen's Gambit is the Rolls Royce of chess openings. Smooth development, central control, and a space advantage are a few of the joys of playing this opening with the white pieces. One of the critical defenses to the Queen's Gambit is the Classical Slav variation. Alekhine and Euwe played this opening almost exclusively during their world championship match in 1935.
The Classical Slav seeks to solve the problem black encounters in the Queen's Gambit Declined: a bad light square bishop. Black defends the center with 2...c6 instead of 2...e6 so that the light square bishop can be developed outside the pawn chain. However, Black should insert the capture ...dxc4 before playing ...Bf5 as prophylaxis against Qb3 attacking the vulnerable d5 and b7 pawns.
In this game, my opponent wanted his cake and to eat it too. He wanted both the central control of the Queen's Gambit Declined and the piece coordination of the Classical Slav. Watch my analysis below to see how my opponent paid the price:
