On Mon, 24 May 2004 14:12:36 +0200, "Holbox"
wrote:

Hi people,

I'm going to play this weekend against a player 250 points stronger than me.

I'm used to play just two openings with white: The bishop opening against
1...e5 (with d3) or the king's indian attack.

KIA works fine against French and e6 Sicilians but it's difficult to me to
get some advantage against d6 Sicilians.

Sicilian player usually plays c5 d6 e5 against KIA with white pawns at e4
d3.
Against the black structure the white's goal may be to play f4 but, the
knight at f3 slows this "manouvre".

I tried, sometimes, the closed sicilian. It seemed to work better to me to
get a king side attack than KIA Probably just because the king knight goes
to e2 freeing the way to play f4 as fast as possible.

What would you try, KIA or Closed Sicilian, against a sicilian player?

In a Closed Sicilian should white play f5 as in the King Indian Defense and
try to open the g column after the g4-g5 advance?
Or
Should maintain the pressure over e5 ?

Thx

I would play the KIA (if that is what you are familiar with) even
though when Black plays ...e5 he can usually equalize quickly. The
main reason for my choice is that I doubt that you could do much more
than memorize a few particular lines of the Closed Sicilian by the
weekend and that runs a rather large risk that even if by some miracle
your opponent plays exactly the line you have memorized you will still
have a position that you may be slightly better but don't know how to
proceed. What you should probably do if you wanted to change your
repertoire against the Sicilian would be to spend more time studying
the ideas behind a particular anti-sicilian variation. That being
said there is quite a bit of similarity of ideas with the KIA and
Closed Sicilian and you proabably could transfer your knowledge of
middlegame plans more quickly than if you changes to another way of
combatting the Sicilian (e.g. 2.c3 or 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bbf5+).


Regarding your specific question about playing f5, the answer is it
depends on how Black reacts to White's opening plans. I play the
Closed Sicilian as White and one book that I have found particularly
helpful is John Emms "Attacking with 1e4". Emms divides Black
responses into three groups:
a) Black plays ...g6 and ...Bg7 similar to a Sicilian Dragon e.g.
1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.g3 g6 4.Bg2 Bg6 and here Emms recommends 5.d3 and
6.Be3 against most normal responses by Black. In some lines White can
play f2-f4-f5 while other lines focus on Qd2, Bh6, exchanging the
bishop at g7 and playing h2-h4-h5 to pry open the kingside.
b) Black plays ...e6 and ...d5 e.g. 1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Bg2.
Here the position opens more and the idea of f2-f4-f5 never comes up.
c) Black plays moves as if the opening were a normal open sicilian
e.g. 1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.g3 Nf6 4.Bg2 Nc6 5.d3 e6 6.Be3. In these
lines f2-f4-f5 are the most likely way of pressing the attack.

Note that Emms book is a repertoire book rather than a thorough
treatment of the Closed Sicilian and so does not cover the 6.f4, the
early Nge2 or the Nh3 lines. If you are interested in other lines
especial early f4 lines I recommend Garly Lane's "The Ultimate Closed
Sicilian"

Mike Ogush
USCF 1961