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Title: Play the French, 3rd edition Author: John Watson Language: Pages: 272 Cover: Paperback Published: 2003 Publisher: Everyman Chess Homepage: http://everymanchess.com Price: £ 14,99 ISBN: 1-85744-337-3 Reviewed by: Soren Sogaard Date: 8/1 2004

Play the French, 3rd edition

I think it is 15 years since I asked my "old" teammate FM Carsten Hansen (reviews at Chess Cafe) if he could recommend a book to me. He highly recommended Watson's book "Play the French", and after a quick glance I bought it - it is always nice to have a good book on your bookshelf ;-)  Carsten was right with his recommendation and since that time Watson is one of my favourite authors. Of course I also bought the second edition in 1996, and now I am about to review the 3rd edition for which I have high expectations.

Play the French was published in 1984 (Pergamon Press), the second edition came in 1996 (Cadogan Chess) and now we have Play the French (3rd edition) published by Everyman Chess. Back in 1984 Watson's book took up 212 pages, in 1996 he used the same format where he used 224 pages with a smaller typesetting. With the new edition the format of the book is bigger and he also had to use 272 pages to make a complete repertoire book for Black. My guess is that the new edition contains twice as much as the first edition, and this despite the fact that Watson doesn't cover everything. It is a repertoire book for black and this also means that he maybe doesn't cover your favourite line.

In the book you find a "guest writer". Chapter 12 (1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5 c5 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.bxc3 Qc7) was written entirely by Hans Olav Lahlum. Also Joachim Wintzer (reviews at Karl Online) and Antti Koponen help the author with suggestions and new ideas.

Contents

• Bibliography
• Introduction

1. Advance Variation: Introduction
2. Advance Variation: 5...Bd7
3. Advance Variation: 5...Qb6
4. King's Indian Attack
5. Exchange Variation
6. Tarrasch Variation: Introduction and 3...c5 
7. Tarrasch Variation: 3...Be7
8. Winawer Variation: Fourth Move Alternatives
9. Winawer Variation: Fifth Move Alternatives
10. Winawer Variation: Main Line with 7.Qg4
11. Winawer Variation: Positional Lines
12. Winawer Variation: Black Plays 6...Qc7
13. Classical Variation: 4.e5
14. Classical Variation:: 4.Bg5 (4...dxe4 5.Nxe4 Be7)
15. Odds and Ends

• Index of Variations

The Advanced Variation

I haven't kept up with the theory in the last years, but it was nice to look at the variations again. I can honestly say that many of the variations and evaluations didn't change much in the last few years. There are variations that made a great impression on me and one of them is in the Advanced Variation where I didn't kept up with the theory. After I read this book I will start playing 9.Bb2 with white!

1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5 4.c3 Nc6 5.Nf3 Qb6 6.a3 Nh6 7.b4 cxd4 8.cxd4 Nf5 9.Be3 f6! 10.Bd3!

10...Nxe3 11.fxe3 fxe5 12.b5 Nxd4
     Here I only knew that White was better in the game Lars Bo Hansen - Mikkel Antonsen, Farum 1993 where black played 12...e4. Watson also mentions the game Prie-De la Villa where play continued 12...e4?! 13.bxc6 exd3? 14.Ne5 and white was much better.

13.exd4 e4 14.Bxe4 dxe4
    After the continuation mentioned by Watson black has absolutely no problems. Maybe I should start playing the French with black?

A Repertoire Book

As already mentioned this is a repertoire book, and the book doesn't consider major moves like e.g. 9...Be7 that was played by one of the reviewers at Seagaard ChessReviews some month ago. The game is from the Danish Team Championship 2003:

1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5 4.c3 Db6 5.Sf3 Sc6 6.a3 Sh6 7.b4 cxd4 8.cxd4 Sf5 9.Lb2 Le7
    Watson (in the notes to his recommendation 9...Bd7):

 "There are several move order issues here. The text prevents 10.Bd3 in view of the hanging d-pawn. Although 9...Be7 is played consistently as well (e.g., by Lputian), it doesn't prevent that move, and I also prefer to have the e7 square to retreat the knight to after White's g4. Still, 9...Be7 has it's own advantages and my choice here is as much a matter of taste as an objective assessment." 

     The game continued with

10.Le2 a5 11.b5 a4 12.0-0 0-0 13.Kh1 Sa5 14.Sc3 Sc4 15.Lxc4 dxc4 16.Lc1 Td8 17.Le3 Da5 18.Dc2 b6 19.De4 Tb8 20.Tfc1 Lb7 21.Dg4 Da8 22.Se1 Td7 23.Dd1 Ld5
     with a good position for black.

Another example can be found in the Classical Variation after the moves 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 where Watson looks at 4...dxe4 5.Nxe4 Be7. A practical suggestion because you don't have to look at the complicated variations after 4...Bb4 5.e5.

In Depth Variations

The book are first of all a practical guide on how to play the French, and most of the variations are easy to remember and play over the board. On a few occasions Watson also takes a closer look at some of the most critical variations. One of these can be found in Tarrach Variation where he uses 7½ pages discussing

1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nd2 c5 4.exd5 Qxd5 5.Ngf3 cxd4 6.Bc4 Qd6 7.0-0 Nf6 8.Nb3 Nc6 9.Nbxd4 Nxd4 10.Nxd4 a6 11.Re1

An extremely important position and as you can see from one of the variations below it is something you have to look at before trying it at the board. One variation goes like this:

11...Qc7 12.Bb3 Bd6 13.Nf5 Bxh2+ 14.Kh1 0-0 15.Nxg7 Rd8 16.Qf3 Kxg7 17.Bh6+ Kg6 18.c3 e5 19.Bc2+ e4 20.Rxe4 Bf5 21.Rg4+ Nxg4 22.Qxf5+ Kxh6 23.Qxh7+ Kg5 24.Qf5+ Kh6 with a draw

Another critical variation from the Winaver stems from the famous game Tal-Donner Wijk aan Zee 1968 where black according to Watson (and Moles) are OK. The move 22...Nc4! (yes it is move 24!) should give black the best chances according to Watson.

Final Remarks

After looking at some variations in depth and browsed through the rest of the book, I can say that it lived up to my great expectations. I have played the French both as black and white, and the discoveries I found is also mentioned in Watson's book. He gives correct evaluations at the key moments, and this leads me to say that you can trust this guy! If you didn't play the French all your life it is good to know that Watson knows what he is talking about.

An example in the Exchange Variation: 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 exd5 4.c4 Bb4+

"A move that this book helped to bring to attention. I think that it casts into doubt the value of 4.c4 as a practical weapon...."

Watson also mentions the move order 4...Nf6 5.Nf3 Bb4+ which also is annoying for white. I fully agree as I knew this for many years because of the difficulties I found playing the position over the board. I personally also tried 4.Nf3 Bd6 5.c4, but white again fails to find any advantage if black just play normal developing moves. From white's point of view it is very unpleasant that Watson always suggests the most annoying moves. If you are black you only need to know one thing: buy this book!