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ChessOpenings Beginners

The document recommends three openings for beginners: 1) The Scandinavian Defense against 1.e4 which is simple to learn with the idea of developing pieces quickly. 2) The Queen's Gambit Declined against 1.d4 which provides a universal setup against many white openings with the plan of pushing c5. 3) The London System for white which guarantees smooth development through almost automatic moves with plans of advancing in the center or on the flanks.

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Ajay Tewari
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133 views

ChessOpenings Beginners

The document recommends three openings for beginners: 1) The Scandinavian Defense against 1.e4 which is simple to learn with the idea of developing pieces quickly. 2) The Queen's Gambit Declined against 1.d4 which provides a universal setup against many white openings with the plan of pushing c5. 3) The London System for white which guarantees smooth development through almost automatic moves with plans of advancing in the center or on the flanks.

Uploaded by

Ajay Tewari
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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What are the best openings for beginners who wants to enjoy the

game?

This type of player needs something solid, quick to learn, without


too much memorization required. For this type of player, I can
recommend the following openings.

(Bear in mind that a player needs at least two openings with Black
– one against 1.e4 and one against 1.d4 and the other closed
systems – and one with White.)

Best Openings for Beginners 1: Scandinavian Defense


With Black against 1.e4, I would recommend the Scandinavian
Defence.
It’s simple and easy to learn, there is not much theory and the
ideas behind it are easy to grasp. To give you a concrete example,
I recommended the Scandinavian Defence with 3…Qd8 (after 1.e4 d5
2.ed Qxd5 3.Nc3) to a friend of mine who wanted something quick and
efficient to start the game with.
Black’s idea in the Scandinavian is simple – he gets the bishop out
to f5 or g4, then the pieces are developed in the following
fashion: the pawns go to c6 and e6, the knights go to d7 and f6,
the other bishop to e7 and Black castles.
There are a few ideas in the middlegame, like the knight jump to
d5, what to do if White takes on d5 and a Carlsbad Structure arises
after Nxd5 cxd5, striving for the …c5 push, the ideas with …a5-a4
and that was pretty much it. This makes the Scandinavian Defence a
very practical opening and one that all beginners love because it
is the ideal opening for them – a little to learn and then they
feel ready to play it.

Best Openings for Beginners 2: Queen’s Gambit Declined


With Black against 1.d4, I would recommend the Queen’s Gambit
Declined.
The reason for this recommendation is that the set-up of the
Queen’s Gambit Declined is universal against everything – against
1.Nf3, 1.c4, 1.b3, 1.f4
Black can simply develop in Queen’s Gambit Declined fashion by 1…
d5, 2…e6, 3…Nf6, 4…Be7 and 5…0-0. Then his main idea is to develop
the light-squared bishop to b7 with the help of …b6 and aim for the
…c5 push. The knight from b8 can go to d7 or c6, depending on
circumstances.
This is more or less everything the beginner needs to know in order
to play the opening comfortably and obtain a good position after
it.

Best Openings for Beginners 2: London System


With White, I would recommend the London System.
Similar to the Scandinavian, it is simple and straight-forward. It
guarantees smooth development and a robust position in the center.
It can also be learned easily as White’s moves are almost
automatic: 1.d4, 2.Bf4, 3.e3, 4.Nf3, 5.c3, 6.Nbd2 (these last two
moves can be played in inverted move-order), 7.Bd3 (or 7.Be2) and
castling.

At some point, the move h3 can be played to secure the dark-squared


bishop and there you are – White has a solid position with good
centre control and development and no weaknesses. His plans
afterward are also relatively simple: he can jump with the knight
on e5 and build his play around it, he can take on c5 and push e4
or c4, he can expand on the queenside with b4 and a4, he can use
the a-pawn to grab space on the queenside with a4-a5-a6. Again,
this is more than enough for the beginner to start the game with
White and obtain a good starting position in the middlegame.
Looking for More Best Openings for Beginners?
As can be noted from the brief descriptions of the openings above,
a common characteristic of all three best openings for beginners is
that to a certain degree they are all “schemes.”
Schemes are openings that can be played more or less automatically,
without paying attention to what the opponent is doing.
Another example of a scheme is the King’s Indian Attack (1.Nf3,
2.g3, 3.Bg2, 4.0-0, 5.d3, 6.Nbd2 and 7.e4), for example. The
essence of the schemes is their simplicity. The schemes are a good
short-cut in studying openings because they are safe and they
guarantee a good middlegame position.
An important factor that unifies all these three openings, and one
that is also characteristic of a scheme, is that it is difficult to
go wrong in them and, perhaps even more important for beginners, to
blunder something. This is of utmost importance for beginners, as
blundering early has the tendency to kill the joy from that
particular game.
Creating a simple opening repertoire as outlined above can be a
quick first step for a beginner to start the game with a guarantee
that he or she will get a game. By playing a scheme the beginner
will also feel confident of not only the opening but also of the
middlegame as he will have some knowledge of the possible plans
that he or she can follow up with.
Only when the level of these aspects of the game has been raised,
should the player (now not a beginner anymore) return to the
opening and re-evaluate whether these openings still suit his or
her needs.

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