My first complete Sicilian Repertoire for Black

Try out the Sicilian !

The Sicilian is my favorite opening : asymetric, sharp, a lose or win result ! Of course, one can argue "its too sharp", "it's not for beginners", but in reality the more you get to understand it, the more fascinating it gets. As a Sicilian player, you need to know how to handle quite a few lines, but heyy that's part of the learning process. I reckon there are quite a few types of Sicilian styles : some people play Nc6 on the 2nd move (which most likely will go into a Taimanov with e6 / Lowenthal with e5) which is totally not my style (I find it passive but if you're good at endgames, this is the way to go !). I personally go for the Najdorf which occurs after the following moves :

Of course you almost never get an Open Sicilian below 2000, so let's dive into the anti sicilian world :

The Anti-Sicilian World

Next up let's look at the smith-morra gambit and the Alapin :

Often times, people say that you should transpose the Smith-Morra into an Alapin by declining the gambit. But I reckon you should just accept it and it will lead you to a easy game as long as you are away or the e-pawn push threat (when the rook and queen are on the d-file). For me, the Alapin can get tricky if you've never seen it before, but in general it's just not very ambitious (just like all anti-sicilians). By the way, look at the master database and you will that the draw rate is especially high and black often has equal or better chances than white.

These anti-sicilians are way too classical, that's why sometimes you would encounter the Wing-gambit sicilian. The Staunton-Cochrane Variation is also a possible anti-sicilian. If anyone is interested, I'll add a bonus section later on these 2 anti-sicilians ! But as a good rule of thumb, most likely, just follow the opening principles and everything will go alright.

Open Sicilian : The Najdorf

There are indeed many variations and it is a rich line. But no worries ! If you are below 2000, you will almost only encounter the popular English attack and nothing else. It is actually quite easy to play it when you are aware of the basic ideas. Basic ideas involve in the a-b pawn push, rook and queen on the c or b file and sometimes the black knight goes to c5. Just so you know, this isn't the only way to deal with the English Attack, you can very well go for e6 and a scheveningen setup.

Additional ressources :

- For the Moscow, Wesley So recommends it for white in his chessable e4 lifetime repertoire. Try to see how to break it ! (or at least not to get into a bad position as black) Especially that second line, it's quite interesting to analyse it yourself.

- If you want to gain more understanding of the two popular anti-sicilians (Alapin and Smith Morra), checkout Daniel Naroditsky's speedrun where these openings are often featured. 

- Of course, Anish Giri's Najdorf lifetime repertoire features the Najdorf. But you can also have more insights on the Alapin as he covers it. (even in his short&sweet)

- Finally, if you do want to play a Smith Morra with white, checkout Marc Esserman's book Mayhem in the Morra! 

I'll be happy to answer any questions, feel free to DM me !