Basics of the Sicilian Defense _ Chess

Hi , my name is Rebecca Taxman and I am with chess NYC .

Today , I'm gonna show you the basics of the Sicilian defense .

Now , when people think of the Sicilian , they're like , whoa , it's a huge opening .

This is one of the longest defenses for Black .

It has been , there are probably about over 10 variations that can be strongly played in the Sicilian defense .

I play , I have played the Sicilian defense maybe over 2000 times .

And every time that I play it , I learn something new .

So today I'm just gonna show you the raw basics of the Sicilian defense .

So let's start .

Usually white wants to start off with E four , controlling the center .

Now , instead of playing E five , black decides to play C five A counter center white then proceeds with night F three .

And now again , there are different variations that can be played here .

But the typical variation is D six creating a minor , a little pawn chain and opening up way for the bishop development .

Next , white wants to develop and attack the center .

So they played D four .

This is a must take then white takes back .

Now we noticed that white seems to have a little bit of an advantage here because they have their night in the center and a pawn in the center .

We want to stop white from playing C four , which is called the Mexi bind .

And this is , we want to stop them from playing this and really controlling a lot of the center .

In order to do that , we play night F six attacking the E four pawn .

Therefore , white can now not play this because then we can take the E four pawn .

White's next move is night C three .

Now , in order to stop an attack on this B five square , which is aiming directly at black's king , it is extremely imperative that black plays A six to stop an attack on B five .

The night can now not come to B five .

This night cannot come to B five .

This bishop is hindered from coming to B five and is forced to go to C four or somewhere further back .

And this is the raw basics of the ciliate .

From here , we can go on to many different variations such as the , the and the dragon just to name a few .