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| Jun-11-04 | | Swindler: What happened to this nice variation? Nobody at the top seem to play it anymore. Is it refuted or has someone found a good line against it? |
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| Jun-11-04 | | Shadout Mapes: I think the French in general isn't seem as much, as for this variation, it got a bad reputation in the recent Leko vs Radjabov, 2003 despite the good opening black played. |
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| Jun-12-04 | | Swindler: Ok thanks, I didn't know about that game! |
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| Jul-01-04 | | nikolaas: Does anybody know something about this MacCutcheon? Who was it? Why is this opening named after him? |
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| Jul-01-04 | | Cecil Brown: I think the variation is named after John Lindsay MacCutcheon, an American amateur player. There was a reference to him playing a thematic correspondence match in this variation against Pillsbury in 1901 at Chesscafe.com in the Kibitzer column by Tim Harding in ~January 2001. And BCO 2 ( co authored by Ray Keene ) quotes a game Steinitz-MacCutcheon, New York 1885 in this line. I've seen the name spelt both McCutcheon and MacCutcheon, but I'm fairly sure they are the same player. |
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| Jul-01-04 | | nikolaas: <Cecil Brown> Thanks a lot. I never heard of him. |
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| Jul-01-04 | | drukenknight: The Steinitz/Macutheon game is considered the seminal game, it is annotated in Tartakover's book. Macutheon was an amateur but had played this defense a lot in New York, his game against Steinitz was a simul. and he won. Apparently no one had thought of 6...h6 and when Steinitz saw it he had to rethink. |
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| Jul-01-04 | | Cecil Brown: The following link includes a copy of the Steinitz-McCutcheon game and a little bit more info about him. http://www.correspondencechess.com/... |
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| Jul-13-04 | | nikolaas: <chessgames.com> Could you possibly include these McCutcheon games on http://www.correspondencechess.com/...? They seem to be important games. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: <acirce> in the game that i asked about earlier <1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 Bb4 5.e5 h6 6.Bd2 Bxc3 7.bxc3 Ne4 8.Qg4 g6 9.Bd3 Nxd2 10.Kxd2 c5 11.h4> what if 11...Qa5 instead of 11...Nc6? mco-14 gives 11.h4 Qa5 12.h5 g5 13.f4? cxd4 14.Nf3 dxc3+ 15.Ke2 Qa4+! pinning the f pawn. seirawan-makarychev,rekjavik 1990. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | acirce: That's a good question. I seem to recall that I have been thinking about it before since my reference book doesn't mention it (Pedersen: <The Main Line French: 3.Nf3>) Seirawan's solution doesn't impress but perhaps 12.Nf3 Nc6 13.Qf4 (played by Chandler and Hebden) or 12.h5 g5 13.Nf3, but h5 lacks much sting if ..g5 isn't followed up by f4, as otherwise the f4-square is just taken away from the queen.. a relatively quick look makes me prefer 12.Nf3, but it deserves a more careful analysis. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: <acirce> how critical is the e2 square for the king in the variations you worked out? i ask because after 11.h4 Qa5 12.Ne2 would seem to either solve the problems of 12.Nf3 and f2-f4, or force a draw by perpetual check.(or the loss of the rook)12.Ne2 c4 13.Bxg6 f7xg6 14.Qxg6+, etc. i think its good that us kramnik fans be aware of such drawing lines. ;-) |
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| Nov-04-04 | | clocked: <square dance> white does not want a perp there... Black should just play Nc6 |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: <acirce> actually i dont think that 12.Ne2 forces a draw at all, but after 12...c4 13.Bxg6 Rg8 i think white is better. i think 12.c4 would receive a ? because it eliminates the Q-side counterplay for black. i dont see the move 12.Ne2 in the opening explorer though so im guessing there is something wrong with it. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: <clocked> well the point is that in certain tournament situations it might make sense to play for a draw and i do think you are correct about 12...Nc6 or at least not 12...c4. thanks for the input. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: im really just wondering about 12.Ne2 and this move hasnt been played before. after a second look i dont think 12...c4 makes any sense for black as it seems to put white in a better situation. i will leave my previous "forced draw" post up as an advertisement for fritz, junior, shredder,etc. ;-) |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: this game has a similar position that may provide some answers.L Helm vs O Miron, 2001 |
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| Nov-04-04 | | acirce: 12.Ne2 has been played (Bittorf-Harding corr 1992) Harding replied with 12..Nc6 which is much better than the immediate ..c4 on which indeed follows Bxg6. ..c4 remains a possibility if White for example plays Qf4, and the knight on e2 doesn't defend e5 which is a little awkward. That game went on 13.Rh3 cxd4 14.Nxd4 Nxe5 15.Qf4 -- just sacrificing the e-pawn -- and White eventually won |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: ok after 12...c4 fritz8 gives a -1.28 evaluation. i guess this is the type of analysis you get from someone who plays 3min blitz all the time! so the line fritz8 is giving is 12...c4 13.Bxg6 Rg8 14.Bxf7+ Kxf7 15.Qf4+ Kg6 16.g4 Nc6 17.g5. this is after a few minutes of analysis. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: apparently i had fritz5.32 analyzing the position instead of fritz8 so i will let the infinite analysis run for a while and then get to back with the results. maybe this way i can get some work done. ;-) btw, thanks for the info <acirce>. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | acirce: Try make it think for a longer time, I'm sure it'll come to its senses. Mine does. 15.Qh5+ might be better, btw. White is clearly better with or without Fritz :-) He gets three pawns for the bishop so the material losses are minimal. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | acirce: Oh, ok, that second post of yours came while I was typing mine. |
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| Nov-04-04 | | square dance: <acirce> ive had the infinite analysis running on move 12.Ne2 for over three hours now and and it didnt consider 12...c4 until its 18 option! initially i only had the program considering the first ten options, btw. it gave 12...Qa4 13.Ng1 Qa5. next is 12...Nc6 13.dxc Nxe5 14.Qd4 etc. the evaluation for the first ten options for black are all within 0.25, so i think its safe to say that 12.Ne2 is roughly equal! ;-) |
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| Aug-15-05 | | chess man: The MacCutheon was Capablanca's most favorite variation in the French. |
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| Nov-11-05 | | capanegra: <chess man <The MacCutheon was Capablanca's most favorite variation in the French.>> Were did you read that? At least in the database there are only two games with Capa playing the MacCutheon, and the results are not very encouraging: http://www.chessgames.com/perl/ches... |
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