I learned this line from the late great Ken Smith (of Smith-Morra fame),about 30 years ago. He showed it to me on a flight back to Dallas, I think it was from one of the World Open tournaments in Philadelphia (probably 1980 or 1981), when Chess Digest was about to publish Andrew Soltis' analysis on it. He called it the "Chameleon Sicilian". It's probably suspect these days, but it avoids a lot of opening theory that I'm too old to bother with. This game shows how a very good player can sometimes fall victim to "canned" analysis even in a "correspondence" game - I've gotten a lot of mileage out of that 4-hour "analysis session" over the years!
3... Nb8c6 4. g3 a6 5. Bf1g2 Qd8c7 6. O-O b5
?! "White hasn't played d3 yet, so now white can open up the position without losing a tempo, and the counter-fianchetto by black will not be good enough against the white setup" (Andrew Soltis' early-80's analysis of a similar position).
7. d4 cxd4 8. Ne2xd4 Bc8b7
"This is a very dangerous position for black. He has lost too much time with his Q-side." 30 years ago, I was shown this exact position, and how to refute it! I think this is the 4th or 5th time I've played this exact game ...
9. Rf1e1
Black will now have issues developing his K-side pieces. The pawn push to e5 is looming (after, e.g., Bf4), and with the rook x-ray on black's K, there are tactical tricks involving the d5 square.
9... d6
? I think 9 ... Ne5 is the correct move here. Another try might be 9 ... Nxd4, though after 10.Qxd4 e5 11.Nd5! white has a great position.
10. Nc3d5
! Exploiting the rook x-ray.
10... exd5
? Objectively better is 10 ... Qd8 11.Nxc6 Bxc6 12.a4, and white's position is strong but not yet winning.
