Ideas nehind this opening moves

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.g3 Ba6 5.Qa4 Bb7 - start of
Mamedyarov,S (2760) - Polgar,Ju (2682)
Presidents Cup Baku AZE (1), 2010.04.29

Whats the point of Ba6,Qa4 and Bb7?

Originally posted by vishyanand
Whats the point of Ba6,Qa4 and Bb7?

Ba6 obviously attacks c4, and more generally Black wants to exert pressure on the a6/f1 diagonal given that the White bishop is going to g2 and not longer contesting the a6/f1 diagonal.

With Qa4, White defends c4 but also hampers the development of Black's knight on b8 since it is now solely responsible for defending the bishop on a6.

Bb7 eases the knight's development once again and now contests the a8/h1 diagonal instead. Of course, White will contest this too with Bg2.

Compare Black playing Bb7 immediately, instead of Ba6. This is also quite common. The difference being that White's queen remains on d1 rather than a4, and that is an important difference: maybe White's queen is better on d1 than a4. Don't assume that a move like Qa4 is necesarily a good development move; the queen may prove to be misplaced on a4. Of course, with GMs willing to play both sides, it's an idea worthy of contesting.

The Queen's Indian Defence (and other openings for that matter) has other moves, the aim of which is to distract the opponent's pieces onto poorer squares. e.g. Black playing a Bb4+, White responding Bd2, and only then Black playing Be7. Again, the idea being that White's bishop is less ideal on d2 (sometimes it goes onto the a1/h8 diagonal via b2, while leaving c3 for the knight - not so easy from d2).

Originally posted by vishyanand
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.g3 Ba6 5.Qa4 Bb7 - start of
Mamedyarov,S (2760) - Polgar,Ju (2682)
Presidents Cup Baku AZE (1), 2010.04.29

Whats the point of Ba6,Qa4 and Bb7?

Hey what are you doing here? I thought you were busy in sofia?
🙄😴🙄

Wouldn't it be spooky if Anand played the Ba6 Queen's Indian line in his next game with black?

Originally posted by Varenka
Ba6 obviously attacks c4, and more generally Black wants to exert pressure on the a6/f1 diagonal given that the White bishop is going to g2 and not longer contesting the a6/f1 diagonal.

With Qa4, White defends c4 but also hampers the development of Black's knight on b8 since it is now solely responsible for defending the bishop on a6.

Bb7 eases the kni ...[text shortened]... onto the a1/h8 diagonal via b2, while leaving c3 for the knight - not so easy from d2).

Nice post. You should be writing chess books, not wasting your time here!

Originally posted by peacedog
Nice post. You should be writing chess books, not wasting your time here!

Dont be silly

He should be on youtube so I can subscribe to him!

Originally posted by peacedog
Wouldn't it be spooky if Anand played the Ba6 Queen's Indian line in his next game with black?

He's probably reading this as we speak, and plotting to play it. We'll all be banned for providing third party assistence.

Originally posted by vishyanand
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.g3 Ba6 5.Qa4 Bb7 - start of
Mamedyarov,S (2760) - Polgar,Ju (2682)
Presidents Cup Baku AZE (1), 2010.04.29

Whats the point of Ba6,Qa4 and Bb7?

I found another game in John Nunn's "Understanding Chess Move By Move" that transposes into this game, J. Timman - J. Polgar (Malmo, 2000). The move order there is:

1. Nf3 Nf6
2. c4 b6
3. d4 e6
4. g3 Ba6
(5. Qb3 Nc6)

Nunn comments that 4. ... Ba6 is an attempt to force a concession from white. In his opinion, the response 5. Qa4 cedes control of the d4 square, to which black might want to reply 5. ... c5. The move 5. Qb3 in the 2000 game avoids this defect, but at the expense of exposing the queen to attack on b3. The "natural" move 5. b3 provides black with an annoying opportunity in 5. ... Bb4+ that leads to the undermining of white's centre but now on d5 instead of d4. Apparently Judit prefers a more straight-forward plan today, as the 2010 text move 5. ... b7 seems to indicate to me that the attack on d5 can start earlier, possibly involving Nb8-Nf6-Nxd5 which could leave the a6-bishop undefended.

Interesting how analysis changes over time!

EDIT: Great comments from Varenka as well. 🙂

wow! thanks guys,great comments.