A Short Book Review of Kotronias' The Modern Spanish: Breyer and Zaitsev Systems

Despite my best efforts, publishers still send me books to review from time to time. This can be irritating, as a proper book review requires a serious time investment. Ignoring the book and doing nothing, though justifiable under the circumstances, bothers me too. So I'll split the difference, mention the books, and offer some very general comments.

We begin with a book by Greek grandmaster Vassilios Kotronias. (You might think his nationality would bias me in favor of his book. It's possible that I'm slightly inclined to be sympathetic, but as I've had no difficulty in criticizing other Greek authors, when relevant, you can rest assured that any bias I do have will be easily overcome.) He's no longer at his playing peak, when he was over 2600 (age and book-writing aren't helpful to one's rating), but he's still a good GM and a very well-respected analyst. His series of books on the King's Indian are exceptionally good and have been widely praised, and this new work seems to demonstrate the same virtues: Kotronias seems to know everything that has been tried and offers an enormous amount of new analysis; analysis that is part of his normal working process and not something thrown together for the sake or making a quick buck on a book. It is evident that he understands what is going on, both in the particulars and in terms of generalities as well, when applicable. The text is dense with analysis, but Kotronias lets the reader up for a gulp of air every so often. Here is a great passage on pages 107-8 that comes after a lengthy analysis of the main line Breyer variations with 20.Bg5 (The preceding moves: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 d6 8.c3 0-0 9.h3 Nb8 10.d4 Nbd7 11.Nbd2 Bb7 12.Bc2 Re8 13.Nf1 Bf8 14.Ng3 g6 15.a4 c5 16.d5 c4 17.Bg5 h6 18.Be3 Nc5 19.Qd2 h5.)

So what can we conclude after all these lines? I said at some point that the Breyer is an opening that mostly relies on principles rather than concrete variations, but to get a feel of the ideas that form these principles, one has to see a lot of games as well as move the pieces back and forth quite a lot, either in the company of fellow players or with the computer. I must say that quite often after looking at a variety of games concerning a certain position, I fail out of laziness to systematize my thoughts in a way that would help me understand and play the position better.

But actually the Breyer is an opening I have shuffled the pieces around so much that I can afford to tell you one thing or two without even trying to be systematic the way a professional has to be. Here are some:

As White:

(1) Usually strive to play f2-f4. It is only  in rare cases that queenside play can be successful.

(2) Beware of being left with a bad bishop on c2, especially if the opening of the a-file has taken place and, additionally, an exchange of a pair of rooks has also occurred; in endings the bishop can prove to be a liability if White cannot carry out a successful b2-b3 advance.

(3) Consider using the d4-square as a means of attacking b5 if after f2-f4 Black plays ...e5xf4, freeing that square.

(4) If Black commits his bishop prematurely to g7, you do not have to exchange it; strive for Nf3-h2, f2-f4 immediately.

As Black:

(1) Do not move the queen quickly away from d8; it could be missing from the defense later on.

(2) Do not move the bishop to g7 too early; that can prove too committal.

(3) Try to keep decent control of the critical c5-square so that b2-b3 will not find you unpreared on the queenside.

(4) Anticipate the plan with f2-f4; do not only look at your own threats on the queenside.

Those of you familiar with Kotronias's books will either roll your eyes or feel guilt and despair at his referring to his "laziness". Granted, these are general points, but they are quite helpful and sometimes neglected even by very strong players.* Indeed, he harkens back to them in the game from which this is taken, Anand-Oparin, Zurich 2017, where Anand played 20.Kh1 instead of 20.Bg5 and Oparin replied with 20...Qc7, violating the first recommendation for Black given above. Anand replied with 21.Ng5, which wasn't bad, but it was even better to play 21.Nh4, a move that the queen on d8 could have prevented had Oparin chosen the move Kotronias prefers, 20...Nfd7.

Switching from the author to the book, the book, at its most general level, is exactly what the subject line suggests: an investigation of the Breyer System (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 d6 8.c3 0-0 9.h3 Nb8) and the Zaitsev System (the same first eight and a half moves, and then 9...Bb7 10.d4 Re8). It is not a repertoire book; Kotronias goes where the evidence leads him, and is relatively encyclopedic in examining options for both sides. The book comprises 20 games; eight (pp. 19-115) on the Breyer and 12 (pp. 117-349!) on the Zaitsev. Taking over 300 pages to go through just 20 games might seem downright Huebnerian, but it's not that the games as wholes are analyzed to an extraordinary depth; rather, the games serve as the scaffolding for Kotronias's theoretical explorations.

How is the analysis? I checked some of his analysis of the 20.Bg5 line mentioned above, and for the most part it held up, with one significant if secondary exception. After 20...Be7 21.Bh6 Nh7 (only one of several moves he examines, and not the main line) 22.Ra3 Rb8 23.Rea1 Bc8 24.axb5 axb5 the main line (both his, and the main line in practice) is 25.Be3, but he also spends some time looking at the interesting 25.Qe3. He acknowledges that it's not objectively good, but allows that it's probably okay if White wants to play for tricks. Yes, if Black does everything right he's a little better, but not meaningfully so. (And who says he'll do everything right?) The problem is that in the main line of his 25.Qe3 analysis Black is not just a little better, but winning. After 25...Bd7 26.Nd4 h4 27.Ne2 g5 28.Ra7 Kh8 29.Qf3 Bf6 30.Qh5 Rg8 31.Qxf7 Nb7 32.b3 Black can do better than 32...Be8, as given by Kotronias. Instead, 32...g4 is winning. For example, 33.hxg4 Bg7 34.Bxg7+ (34.Be3 Rf8 35.Qh5 Be8 wins the trapped queen) 34...Rxg7 35.Qf3 Qg5 36.Ra8 Rbg8 37.Rxg8+ Rxg8 38.Qe3 Qxe3 39.fxe3 Bg4. Despite White's extra pawn and Black's misplaced knight on b7, Black has a winning advantage thanks to White's tactical problems with e2 and g2.

In Kotronias's defense, I think much of his analysis of 25.Qe3 was old, it's a sideline of a sideline, and he has already acknowledged that 25.Be3 is the better move. And in my admittedly brief check of his work, that was the only notable error I found. There are no chess books containing analysis that goes beyond simple tactics and tablebase endings that will be free from error; the question is how well they do, given the author's strength and the engines available to him at the time of writing. And as far as I can tell here, and from some of the author's other work, he is a conscientious analyst whose work is excellent. Still, as the old line goes, trust...but verify.

As you will have gathered from the foregoing, this book is not aimed at novices or even the average club player. If you're a professional or a correspondence player and you play either side of the Breyer or Zaitsev, it's a must-have. If you're an ambitious adult and at least 2000, or an ambitious youngster rated at least 1900, get it. Everyone else, save your money.

The book's layout could be improved. It was often difficult to figure out where I was in the morass of variations. There are few numbers or letters given to outline the variations, and on small pages with a two-column format indenting would result in lines of text with only two or three characters. Perhaps more spacing and different font sizes and styles (italics, bold type, etc.) would have helped. (I don't know if the book is coming out on the Forward Chess app; if it is, that's probably the best way to go through it.)

For more on the book, go here or here.

* For an example of this same sort of critique, have a look at this entertaining video. (But then, all Dmitry Komarov videos are entertaining. I'm not sure anyone else should be doing live commentary on blitz games.) Komarov criticizes Polgar's ...Qc7 at the 1:38 mark of the video, and as he reiterates this at various points throughout the video  (2:20, 3:50, and 4:16) it becomes increasingly clear that his judgment was correct. (P.S. Stick around for the finish of the Mamedyarov-Nakamura game afterwards. The whole game was fascinating, and worth studying.)