Forums

Sicilian defence: Kronberger Variation

Sort:
TheoEkman

I came across a new move against the sicilian defence 2.Na3. It is the Kronberger Variation and apparently it was played by GM Vadim Zvjaginsev at the 2005 Russian Chess Championship Superfinal. He used it thrice during the tournament, drawing twice and beating Alexander Khalifman. I could not find any other posts regarding this opening so I decided to create one myself. I believe the idea with this move is to play c3 early and fortify the centre. What are your opinion on this opening? Is it solid? Or is it too dubious to play?

king5minblitz119147

It will likely lead to a closed type of position since opening the game would highlight the bad placement of the knight. Its obscurity may well work on your favor if you study it deeply enough. I personally haven't even encountered it although I  have only been playing the Sicilian for about a year now.

A-mateur
king5minblitz119147 a écrit :

It will likely lead to a closed type of position since opening the game would highlight the bad placement of the knight. Its obscurity may well work on your favor if you study it deeply enough. I personally haven't even encountered it although I  have only been playing the Sicilian for about a year now.

I disagree. The Knight, after the move c3, is about to go to c2 and will there control the central square d4. I don't think this is a real "bad placement". 

Ak1raiscool

wth is this opening

ibrust

The eval is about equal.. the problem I see with it is there's no real payoff... if you're gonna compromise your position with an offbeat move at least choose a line that forces black to play sharply, or forces black to play a way he isn't used to. This move doesn't do that, it's just gonna lead to an equal positional game, and for black... your typical sicilian patterns are going to be what he plays... Black will just get a sicilian position while under alot less pressure due to this relatively useless knight / wasted tempo. This is just bad, don't do this. If you want unconventional against the sicilian there are much better options.