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Scandinavian Defense
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The Scandinavian Defense or Center Counter Defense, is a chess opening characterized by the moves
- 1. e4 d5
The Center Counter Defense is one of the oldest recorded openings, first recorded as being played between Francesco di Castellvi and Narciso Vinyoles in Valencia in 1475, and being mentioned by Lucena in 1497. It is one of the oldest asymmetric defenses to 1.e4, along with the French Defence.
Analysis by Scandinavian masters including Collijn showed it is playable for Black.
Although the Center Counter Defense has never enjoyed widespread popularity among top-flight chess players, Joseph Henry Blackburne and Jacques Mieses frequently played it, and greatly developed its theory in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
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Encyclopedia
The Scandinavian Defense or Center Counter Defense, is a chess opening characterized by the moves
- 1. e4 d5
The Center Counter Defense is one of the oldest recorded openings, first recorded as being played between Francesco di Castellvi and Narciso Vinyoles in Valencia in 1475, and being mentioned by Lucena in 1497. It is one of the oldest asymmetric defenses to 1.e4, along with the French Defence.
Analysis by Scandinavian masters including Collijn showed it is playable for Black.
Although the Center Counter Defense has never enjoyed widespread popularity among top-flight chess players, Joseph Henry Blackburne and Jacques Mieses frequently played it, and greatly developed its theory in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Bent Larsen played it from time to time, and defeated World Champion Anatoly Karpov with it at Montreal 1979, spurring a rise in popularity. The popular name also began to switch to the Scandinavian around this time. Starting in the 1960s, David Bronstein and Nona Gaprindashvili would play it occasionally, and Ian Rogers has adopted it frequently starting in the 1980s. In 1995, the Center Counter Defense made a rare appearance in a World Chess Championship match, in the 14th game at New York. Viswanathan Anand as Black obtained an excellent position using the opening against Garry Kasparov, although Kasparov won the game.
It is classified under the B01 code in the Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings.
Main variations
White normally continues 2.exd5 when Black has two major continuations: 2...Qxd5 and 2...Nf6 (Marshall Gambit).
2...Qxd5
After 2...Qxd5,the most commonly played move is 3.Nc3 because it attacks the queen with gain of tempo. Against 3.Nc3, Black has a few choices. 3...Qa5 is considered the "classical" line and is currently the most popular option. Another response for black which has been rising in popularity since the late 1990s and early 2000s because it has been employed by Grandmasters Sergei Tiviakov and Bojan Kurajica, just to name a couple, is the more dynamic 3...Qd6, which is called the Bronstein Variation or Pytel Variation. Less common alternatives include the retreat 3...Qd8, 3...Qe5+?! (the Patzer Variation).
One other possibility is the rare 3...Qe6+ (the Mieses-Kotroc Variation), one idea being that after the natural developing move 4.Be2 (covering the check), Black plays 4...Qg6 attacking the g2 pawn. This system is generally regarded as a terrible line because the black side hasn't developed anything but his queen while white develops all his pieces. An instance where this line was played was by David Letterman as Black in a televised game against Garry Kasparov,, in which Letterman was checkmated in 23 moves.
Returning to the main line after 3.Nc3 Qa5, white can choose from multiple set-ups. A common line is 4.d4 c6 5.Nf3 Nf6 6.Bc4 Bf5 (6...Bg4 is a different option) 7.Bd2 e6. White has a few options, such as the aggressive 8.Qe2, the quiet 8.0-0, or the picturesque 8.Nd5. Just a note, the "horns" on e6 and c6 resemble a Caro-Kann Defence structure, therefore quite a few Caro-Kann players who wanted to expand their repertoire have adapted the Scandinavian Defense.
Another set-up after 3...Qa5 is to target the b7 pawn by fianchetto-ing the bishop on the h1-a8 diagonal, instead placing it on the a2-g8 diagonal, by 4.g3 Nf6 5.Bg2 c6 6.Nf3 followed by 0-0, Rb1, and then exploiting the b7 pawn by b4-b5.
A more "drunken" way to play against 3...Qa5 is with the gambit 4.b4?!. If black plays correctly, white should have no compensation for the sacrificed pawn, but it can be difficult to prove this over the board.
Alternatives to 3.Nc3 include 3.d4, which can transpose into a variation of the Nimzovich Defense after 3...Nc6 (1.e4 Nc6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 Qxd5), or Black can play 3...e5, as well. After 3...Nc6 4.Nf3 Bg4 5.Be2 0-0-0 black has better development to compensate for white's center after a future c4.
Black's move 3...e5 is another line against 3.d4. On the most common move 4.dxe5, black can sacrifice a pawn with 4...Qxd1 or play 4...Qxe5. The latter has not been as popular as the former because the queen has moved twice in the opening and is in the center of the board, which is generally not a good idea in the opening because it could be exploited to gain time. However, grandmasters such as Tiviakov have shown that it is not so easy to exploit the centralized queen.
However, the main move is 4...Qxd1. 5.Kxd1 is usually followed by 5...Nc6 and when white defends the pawn, there follows Bg4+ and 0-0-0. For example 5...Nc6 6.Bb5 Bg4+ 7.f3 0-0-0+ and black has enough compensation for the pawn, because he is better developed and white's king is stuck in the center.
Another common response after 2...Qxd5 is 3.Nf3, where white tries to make black's game difficult because he hasn't committed to anything yet. For example, after 3...Bg4 4.Be2 Nc6 white can transpose with 5.d4, but he has other options, such as just 5.0-0.
The line 3...Qd6 is another way to play against 3.Nc3, and it has recently been growing in popularity. However, at first sight it may look dubious, and even though grandmasters have shown it is perfectly playable, white players against this line have found a strong set-up for white with d4, Nf3, g3, Bg2, 0-0, and a future Ne5 with a strong, active position.
2...Nf6
The other main branch of the Scandinavian Defense is 2...Nf6, sometimes known as the Marshall Gambit after U.S. Chess Champion Frank Marshall, who played the line. The idea is to delay capturing the d5 pawn for another move, avoiding the loss of time that Black incurs in the ...Qxd5 lines after 3.Nc3. Now White has several possibilities:
The Modern Variation is 3.d4. Grandmaster John Emms calls this the main line of the 2...Nf6 variations, saying that "3.d4 is the common choice for White...and it is easy to see why it is so popular."The idea behind the Modern Variation is to give back the pawn in order to achieve quick development. 3...Nxd5 is the most obvious reply. Black wins back the pawn, but White can gain some time by attacking the Knight. White usually responds 4.c4 (although 4.Nf3 is a popular alternative). Now the Knight must move. The most common choices are 4...Nb6, named by Ron Harman and Shaun Taulbut as the most active option, and 4...Nf6, which Emms calls "slightly unusual, but certainly possible." A third alternative is the tricky Kiel Variation (4...Nb4?!), described by Harman and Taulbut as "a speculative try". Black is hoping for 5.Qa4+ N8c6 6.d5? b5!, and Black has a good game. However, White has many alternatives that lead to a large advantage, and the Kiel Variation is seldom seen in practice.
An alternative to 3...Nxd5 is 3...Bg4!?, the sharp Portuguese Variation or Jadoul Variation. In this line, Black gives up the d-pawn in order to achieve rapid development and piece activity; the resulting play is often similar to the Icelandic Gambit. The normal continuation is 4.f3 Bf5 5.Bb5+ Nbd7 6.c4. Occasionally seen is 3...g6, the Richter Variation, which was played on occasion by Karl Richter in the 1930s.
Another common response is 3.c4, with which White attempts to retain the extra pawn, at the cost of the inactivity of the light-square bishop. Now Black can play 3...c6, which is the most common move. The line 4.dxc6? Nxc6, described by Emms as "a miserly pawn grab", gives Black too much central control and development. Most common after 3...c6 is 4. d4 cxd5, transposing to the Panov-Botvinnik Attack of the Caro-Kann Defence. 3...e6!? is the sharp Icelandic Gambit or Palme Gambit, invented by Icelandic Masters who looked for an alternative to the more common 3...c6. Black sacrifices a pawn to achieve rapid development. The most critical line in this double-edged variation is thought to be 4.dxe6 Bxe6 5.Nf3.
A third major alternative is 3.Bb5+. The most popular reply is 3...Bd7, though the rarer 3...Nbd7 is gaining more attention recently. After 3.Bb5+ Bd7, White has several options. The most obvious is 4.Bxd7+, after which White can play to keep the extra pawn with 4...Qxd7 5. c4. The historical main line is 4.Bc4, which can lead to very sharp play after 4...Bg4 5.f3 Bf5 6.Nc3, or 4...b5 5.Bb3 a5. Finally, 4.Be2 has recently become more popular, attempting to exploit the misplaced Bishop on d7 after 4...Nxd5.
White's 3.Nf3 is a flexible move that, depending on Black's reply, can transpose into lines with ...Nxd5 or ...Qxd5.
White's 3.Nc3 transposes into a line of the Alekhine's Defence, normally seen after 1.e4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.exd5, and generally thought to be equal. After 3...Nxd5 4.Bc4, the most common reply is 4...Nb6, although 4...Nxc3, 4...c6, and 4...e6 are also viable continuations.
Alternatives to 2. exd5
There are several ways for White to avoid the main lines of the Scandinavian Defense. One option is to defer or avoid the exchange of e-pawn for d-pawn. This is most often done by 2. Nc3, which transposes into the Dunst Opening after 2...d4 or 2...dxe4. If instead 2. e5?! is played, Black can get into a good French Defence setup with 2...c5, develop the c8 bishop, and play e6 which is a good French because the bishop is not locked up on c8. In the Caro-Kann, there can go 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5, so in the Scandinavian Black plays c5 without spending a tempo, so he has a comfortable position. Other moves, such as 2. d3, are extremely rare.
White can also gambit the e-pawn, most frequently by 2. d4, transposing into the popular Blackmar-Diemer Gambit. Other lines are possible, but are seldom seen, and generally considered highly dubious; among these are 2. Nf3?! (Tennison's Gambit), 2. g4?! (the Zilbermints Gambit), and 2. d3 dxe4 3. Nc3.
In general, none of these sidelines are believed to offer White more than equality, and the overwhelming majority of masters opt for 2.exd5 when facing the Scandinavian. The Scandinavian is thus arguably Black's most "forcing" defense to 1.e4, restricting White to a relatively small number of options. This has helped to make the Scandinavian Defense fairly popular among club-level players, though defenses like the Sicilian Defence are far more common at the Grandmaster level.
Depiction in cinema
The Center Counter Defense is Ron Weasley's opening move in the 2001 film of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone. In the scene in question, Ron (along with Harry Potter and Hermione Granger) have to play a chess game on a giant chessboard with giant chess pieces (it is one of a series of tests that one must pass in order to get to the Philosopher's Stone). Ron uses this defense to verify that the game they are playing is, in fact, exactly like Wizard's Chess (in which chess pieces are enchanted and can smash each other).
The chess positions used in the scene were created by International Master Jeremy Silman, though it is unclear if Silman was responsible for the choice of opening.
See also
External links
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