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Welcome back to ChessOpenings.com! Today's video we'll get a chance to take
a look at the Stonewall Dutch, a formation for black arising out of the
Dutch Defense which begins with the moves pawn to d4 and pawn to f5. With
the move pawn to f5, black takes control over the e4 square and limits the
mobility of whites king's pawn. In the Stonewall formation, black will
later augment his control over the e4 square by including the move d7 to
d5. We'll get a chance today to look at many interesting setups for white,
as well as some important subtleties in the Stonewall. Let's take a look.
The Stonewall Dutch is most often reached after white opens with the move
pawn to d4. With this move, white aims to begin claiming central space and
to offer scope to his queen and to his bishop. And now, if black plays the
move pawn to f5 we have the Dutch Defense. There are many ways black can
play the Dutch Defense, but in the Stonewall Dutch, the subject of this
video, black is going to carry this philosophy of gripping the e4 square
forward with all of his might into the middle game. White's most popular
move in this position, is the simple move pawn to g3 preparing the
fianchetto, the bishop to g2. But I think it's important to stop and
consider the various options for white in this position, to gain an
appreciation of why white often plays the move g2 to g3 in this position.
An aggressive option against the Dutch is to go ahead and play the move e2
to e4 anyway, known as the Staunton Gambit. With the Staunton Gambit, white
aims to break down as quickly as possible via [pawn] and is often is able
to regain the pawn. However, the Staunton Gambit does not have a very good
reputation as there are no methods for black to neutralize it. Instead,
more common sidelines for white involve the possibility of bringing out the
dark squared bishop as quickly as possible. One way to go about this is to
simply play the move bishop to g5, aiming to interfere with some of black's
development as the e pawn is pinned and if the knight comes out to f6,
white has the possibility of inflicting double pawns on to the position
with bishop takes f6. And for example e takes f6.
In the Dutch, since black's pawn has already moved to f5, there's a little
bit more of a vulnerability for black here. If the pawn were still on f7
this would not be such a big deal, these double pawns, but in this position
the pawn on f5 ends up being a little bit more vulnerable.
Another example of the same idea in another line in the same spirit, is to
simply play knight to c3, threatening e2 to e4. And now after black plays
knight f6 defending the square, once again white can look for the idea of
bishop to g5 attacking the knight on f6 and threatening to create double
pawns. And now if black simply plays e6 defending against that possibility
of double pawns, it is known that white gets an advantage with the move
pawn to e4 and variations of this is very comfortable, for white. So
instead of playing e6, defending the knight on f6, black instead plays the
move pawn to d5, defending the e4 square. And at this moment, again white
has the pleasant idea of bishop takes f6, and after e takes f6 white can
look for long term play based on the vulnerability of the pawn on f5.
So the concept of utilizing the bishop on g5, often capturing on f6, is a
fair strategy which white sometimes uses. But time has revealed that white
has even better chances if he can reserve the dark squared bishop and
instead aim to treat it with black's dark squared bishop. This is quite
logical since in the Dutch, black's pawns often end up on light squares,
leaving the dark squares vulnerable. We'll see very instructive examples of
this throughout today's video. The final move I would like to briefly
mention is the possibility of simply playing knight to f3. But for reasons
we will see in a moment, I think this is a very subtle mistake. I'll also
build a case for this at a later point in the video.
Finally, we return to white's most popular strategy, which is simply the
move pawn to g3, preparing to fianchetto the light squared bishop. White
can also play the move pawn to c4 first, as this does not give black any
significant options and then play the move pawn to g3. With g3, white is
choosing the most logical method of developing the bishop since other
methods are not so feasible. After the moves knight-f6 and bishop-g2, in
many variations of the Dutch, this light squared bishop ends up being quite
a beast bearing down on the long diagonal, complicating black's
development, and adding some pressure, and coordinating with the queen's
side attack at a later phase in the game. At this point, black has two
options about how to proceed. He may choose the move pawn to g6 or the move
pawn to e6. And both of these moves address the question of how to deploy
the dark squared bishop. Today, we will look at the move pawn to e6 as this
is the move that allows black to play for the Stonewall variation.
Now white has two options. Once again, he can simply deploy the knight to
f3 in castle king's side and then look for an active plan or he may first
play the move pawn to c4, gaining some more queen side space and a little
bit more central influence. Let's assume that once again white is going to
postpone the deployment of his knight and he is simply going to choose c4
for the time being. And now, if black plays d5 we have arrived at the
Stonewall variation. Black's plan is to complete his Stonewall formation
with the move pawn to c6, and this is the four pawn formation which is
known as the Stonewall. Then, black is looking to complete his deployment
fluidly with the moves bishop-d6, castling king side, and only then to look
for an active plan. In the meantime, he hopes to keep white restrained in
the center using this massive formation of pawns.
Backing up to the position of pawn to d5, the most important drawback of
black's plan has to do with the vulnerable e5 square. Because black has
moved both his d pawns and f pawns forward two squares, the e5 square can
never ever be protected by a pawn. As the game wears on, white is often
able to occupy this square with a knight and then use this knight's
advanced placement as an important asset in the ensuing positional
struggle.
Now, here is the big surprise in the Stonewall Dutch. In this position,
white actually has a choice between deploying the knight on f3 and
deploying the knight on h3. And it turns out that a close look at practical
results, as well as a close study of what is going on in the position,
reveals that the correct square for the knight may be h3. This is a very,
very clever idea by white which takes into account the long ranging plans
in the position. The simple idea behind knight h3, is that once the bishop
comes to d6, white has the opportunity to play bishop f4; a square which is
supported by the knight on h3. As we have discovered earlier, the dark
squared bishops are going to be very important strategic pieces here, as
black has just gone out of his way to consulate his pawns on light squares
and therefore this exchange of dark squared bishops comes as very bad news
for black.
Let us briefly examine some of the issues that arise if white plays knight
to f3, which is actually a bit more popular, but in my opinion, slightly
less efficient for white. After the moves knight f3-c6, black has achieved
his Stonewall formation. Black is ready to complete the deployment of his
bishop and castle. His long term strategic concept is that his barrier of
pawns in the center, will hold up long enough to ensure him time to get his
pieces out and cooperating. Then, he may even have an advantage since he
has a well supported advanced pawn on f5 that could give him extra space
and an attack on the king's side. Play now continues castling king side and
now black has to decide where to deploy his king's bishop. The d6 square is
natural and it's quite important that black select this move, as we will
see in just a moment. In the long term, the bishop on d6 will be important
in adding some influence on the e5 square. If white's knight were on h3,
instead of f3, white could easily prepare the move bishop to f4 in this
position without worrying about getting a damaged pawn structure.
Basically all I am saying here is if the knight had deployed itself to h3
at a earlier stage, white would now be ready to play bishop f4 as that
square would be defended. Now, by far white's most popular move in this
position is the move pawn to b3, aiming to achieve the same bishop exchange
with the move bishop to a3. But here, another important benefit of placing
the bishop on d6 is revealed. Black now has an opportunity to play the move
queen to e7, ruling out the bishop to a3 exchange for quite sometime, and
at the same time the queen and bishop work together very nicely in the
position to help restrain some of the movement of white's queen side pawns,
in particular white will lose the opportunity to play b4 at the right
moment. Black often couples this idea of bringing the queen to e7 and the
bishop to d6 with a later move pawn to a5 to really make sure that these
pawns cannot get rolling, and this hinders white in the middle game.
Most commonly, white now plays bishop to b2 and continues rolling his game
forward. But white's bishop on b2 often turns out to be clumsily placed,
since white would rather have space on the queen's side to deploy his rooks
and knights while expanding the pawns forward. For example, he'd like this
bishop to not be on b2 and he'd like to be able to bring rooks to maybe c1
and b1 and to be advancing these pawns forward. Whereas, with the bishop on
b2, white will have this bishop in the way. This is yet another reason why
white likes to trade bishops early, he just doesn't have that much to do
with the dark squared bishop that fits realistically into his overall
scheme. With all of these points in mind, it appears that black has nearly
managed to balance the game, as black tends to find that he has plenty of
time to complete his development, while white's plate develops rather
slowly here. And remember, after black gets his pieces out, he may even
find himself a little bit better thanks to his extra space on the king
side. It's not uncommon to see black generating more initiative in this
area of the board after getting his pieces out. For example, sometimes
simply playing g7 to g5 even if he's castled on the king's side beginning
to look for a king side attack.
Having understood all of this, we are in a much better position to
understand why white plays the move knight to h3 as an alternative to
knight f3. With knight h3, white is simply preparing bishop f4 getting
ready to exchange the dark squared bishops. And at the same time he avoids
the issues associated with the battery of bishop on d6, queen to e7, which
complicated the queen side play. Interestingly, the move knight h3 has been
known for as long as the Stonewall formation has been known and the great
masters of the past were aware of this move and played it frequently.
However, knight f3 has always been a little bit more popular, most likely
due to the apparent naturalness of the move.
Here play proceeds similar to before with the move pawn to c6, white's
castles king side, and once again black has a choice of where to deploy his
bishop.
Now, if black knows white has positioned his knight on h3 with the main
idea of supporting a bishop exchange on f4, why doesn't he just position
the bishop with the bishop to e7. In fact this is a move, but forcing the
bishop to adopt this post would already be a victory for white since the
bishop is not posted on a it's most active location on d6. One effect of
this, is that white has an easier time dominating the e5 square over the
next several moves.
An attractive and instructive way for white to proceed based entirely on
this idea is, knight to d2, castling king side, queen to c2, showing up the
c4 pawn because we are getting ready to move the d2 knight again in just a
moment. And now the typical plan here is to play knight to f4 to d3 so that
this knight is contacting the e5 square. And then also knight to f3 so that
the other knight is involved in controlling the e5 square. And then follow
this with a timely invasion of the e5 square by one of the knights and
begin rolling these pawns forward; rook a b1 and b4, b5. This is the typical
plan in this position. In this position, this is a big improvement over
having the bishop on b2, since white will find it very easy to get his
pieces cooperating, and with the bishop stuck on e7 as opposed to d6, what
black will tend to find is that he will miss opportunities to have control
over the e5 square and this is a highly interesting position for study.
So in fact, most players to do not play bishop e7, they actually play
bishop to d6, knowing that the bishop is going to bring itself out to f4,
and this is in fact what white plays instantly the move, bishop to f4.
Now one interesting idea for black is to now drop the bishop back to e7.
The idea here, is that white's knight will need to access the f4 square
sooner or later just as we saw before, in order to pivot to the d3 square
and influence the game by controlling e5.
By allowing white's bishop f4 move, black hopes to show that the knight on
h3 is somehow misplaced. If white re-positions his bishop, then he winds up
losing tempo sense where ever white re-positions the bishop, it will have a
harder time gaining a attractive position along any given diagonal.
So what can white do? Well in this position, he simply continues with
[knight to d2] a very similar plan as before. Black castles king side and
once again white plays queen c2, showering up the pawn on c4 and the
intention is to bring the knight to f3. Now at this point, black's
development is a little more complicated than it at first appears. Black's
most natural plan is to continue expanding on the king side, taking
advantage of his extra space with the move h6 and g5. And the other reason
why this is such a interesting plan for black here, is that this aims to
exploit the somewhat confused placement of the knight and the bishop at the
current moment. But what white simply plays now bishop takes b8, just
getting the bishop right out of the way. Rook takes b8 and now white uses
the opportunity to pivot the knight on the f4 square, knight f4, leading to
a favorable position. Once again, white is going to follow the aggressive
strategy of just piling pieces, piling knights in particular up on the e5
square. Now it's important to point out that black has gained the bishop,
the dark squared bishop at the cost of a knight instead of a bishop in this
position, and at the cost of a undeveloped knight. But white still had some
advantages here and is able to control the e5 square. And in this position,
in this closed position it may even turn out that the knights are worth
more than the bishop. As we saw earlier, the dark squared bishop was
usually a problem piece for white anyhow.
Often play continues bishop d6 and now white can again play knight d3 with
the idea of idea knight f3, leading to some advantage or another approach
in this position is actually knight to g6. And after rook e8 bringing the
other knight to f3 and either knight coming to e5, once again leading to
another advantage for white.
Backing up to the position just before h6, you may wonder why black doesn't
just eliminate the option of the exchange on bishop takes b8, simply moving
the knight. However, if black tries knight b to d7, white is able to
demonstrate another unique benefit to the placement of the knight on h3. He
can play knight to g5, striking out the e6 pawn. And amusingly the e6 pawn
is not so easy to defend. For example, if black plays knight to b6 white
simply strikes with c5 and black will lose material anyhow. So in this
position the knight would have to retreat back to b8 and after the move
knight g to f3, white simply re-positions his knight to f3, since it has
completed his drop on h3. And now there is further control over the e5
square. If instead black tries the same idea knight a6 trying to get rid of
this exchange, and white plays a3. Now after the move h6 it is simply known
that after bishop e5, white continues to have some advantage in this
position.
We haven't even come close to exhausting every option for both sides in
this very interesting formation, but I hope you found this brief survey
instructive and enjoyable. We have managed to understand many important
subtleties and many important strategies in the Stonewall and I hope that
you have gained insight into this exciting formation for both sides. That's
all for today and we'll see ya soon!