Simon Williams does it again.

The last time we mentioned English GM Simon Williams on this blog the Ginger GM hisownself had invented a new opening, the Bongcloud Transvestite. In his never ending quest to play the weirdest stuff, he has come up with an improvement on the old Englund Gambit (1 d4 e5?!). Here is the tweet with the evidence.

Been experimenting with my new opening. 1 d4 e6 2 c4 e5!? An improved Englund Gambit - https://t.co/LzwMszc4pd

— Simon Williams (@ginger_gm) May 17, 2018

May God have mercy on our souls, for we are naught but wretched sinners all.

And please, no one mention this to Carlos.

A new book coming soon from Quality Chess

Quality Chess has just sent a new book to the presses, Playing 1.d4 d5 by Nikos Ntirlis. They have also kindly presented a 15 page excerpt to wet our appetites. The excerpt can be found here.

Insider Theory

Today on Twitter, not-quite-our-own Theo Slade had a very interesting exchange with Peter Svidler about opening theory. (@polborta is Svidler's personal twitter account.)

@theosladechess In topical lines in particular, top players independently look at the same positions in great depth, resulting in a pool 1/

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

@theosladechess ... of shared knowledge which has not yet been shown in practice, creating a kind of 'insider theory'. Official theory is 2/

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

@theosladechess ...stuff that has already been seen in published games, and is therefore openly available to everyone.

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

@polborta existed. So would that mean that, eg, Black shouldn't go 9...d5 for fear of "insider theory," or is it more a case of Carlsen 2

— Theo (@theosladechess) November 16, 2016

@theosladechess That's a lot harder to say, requires levels of speculation I am not happy with, sorry. Both are possible.

— Peter Svidler (@polborta) November 16, 2016

Apologies for formatting issues, but I think that's easy enough to follow.

One can come up for many reasons for Svidler to defer further comment, too. Ultimately, anything he says could be construed as giving away information to potential competitors about what he does and doesn't know, or may or may not know. Although choosing what to believe of anything he says after that last tweet would become a poker problem, and not a chess problem, if that makes any sense. (And it may not. I am sick at the moment, and I'm not sure that my brain cells have survived the illness, or if having survived they still function with a reasonable modicum of coherence.)

E62: King's Indian Defense: Fianchetto, Karlsbad, Uhlmann-Szabo System

Learn it. Know it. Live it.

...

The opening moves are

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.Nf3 d6 5.g3 O-O 6.Bg2 Nc6 7.O-O e5

which takes 63 characters to write out. But

 E62: King's Indian Defense: Fianchetto, Karlsbad, Uhlmann-Szabo System

takes 66 characters to write out, and that's not including the five key strokes for the "E62: ". A full 71 key strokes! That's just wacky, and I don't mean the Japanese stand-up comedian.

Here's an online speed chess PROTIP: Playing 8. dxe5 followed up by 9. Bg5 with the idea for White of trading his dark-square bishop for a knight and then playing to make Black's dark-square bishop look stupid works quite well. White's play is easy, and Black usually has to start thinking a bit about how to arrange his remaining minor pieces  so that they don't trip over each other. It shouldn't be that hard, and this must be an old system (look at the names involved), but the Black players I face online (typically 1700-1900 on Chess.com) don't seem to know them, and consequently they burn lots of time. Plus, as often as not the opening of the center takes KID devotees out of their comfort zone. This plan has worked pretty well for me at much slower time controls, too. My favorite game I played this year came out of this opening system in a game in 120.

Disclaimer: Past results do not guarantee future performance.(cont.)

Birth of an Opening

It's not often one can see the birth of a completely new opening in chess. But Simon Williams, the Ginger GM hisownself, managed to invent a new one this week. The new opening gets birthed beginning around the 7:04 mark in the video.

I added a video to a @YouTube playlist https://t.co/3YMZlfoNp6 GM Speed Chess! #99 The 'Bongcloud Transvestite' variation.

— Simon Williams (@ginger_gm) July 16, 2016

I feel better now!

Wesley So: "I'm not hiding any ideas because I don't have many!" #GrandChessTour #c24live pic.twitter.com/LUOCf7xotM

— chess24.com (@chess24com) June 18, 2016