Champion Repertoire (part six)

MIKHAIL Botvinnik won the world championship THREE times, a record that will be hard to beat.*
A repertoire based on Botvinnik's games in ChessBase's 2020 Mega database is the first in this series not to feature open  games - Botvinnik preferred 1.d4 as White and most-often met 1.e4 with 1...e6.
White
Play 1.d4 with the aim of reaching a Rubinstein Nimzo-Indian: 1...Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3. Against the main reply 4...0-0 Botvinnik scored 78% with 5.Bd3, rising to 82% after 5...d5 6.a3. Similarly he scored 83% with 5...c5 6.a3.
Against 4...c5 he scored 90% with 5.Nge2, and used the same move to score 75% against 5...b6.
Against 4...d5 Botvinnik scored 90% with 5.a3.
Against the King's Indian: 1...Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 his chief weapon was the Sämisch: 5.f3. In the main line 5...0-0 6.Be3 e5 he scored 79% with 7.d5, rising to 83% after 7...c6 8.Nge2!?Against 6...Nc6 he favoured 7.Nge2.
Against the Grünfeld: 3...d5 he scored 71% with the Russian System: 4.Nf3 Bg7 5.Qb3. After the mainline continuation 5...dxc4 6.Qxc4 0-0 7.e4 the move he faced most often was 7...Bg4, against which he scored 63% with 8.Be3. Botvinnik's games in Mega20 do bot include today's favourites 7...a6 and 7...Nc6.
In the Queen's Gambit Declined: 1...d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 he usually continued 4.Nf3, quite often reversing the last two moves.
Against 4...Be7 he generally continued 5.Bg5, but on reaching the tabiya arising after 5...0-0 6.e3 Nbd7 he rejected Rc1 in favour of 7.Bd3!? The idea is that after the continuation 7...dxc4 8.Bxc4 c5 9.0-0 cxd4 10.exd4 Nb6 White can drop his light-square bishop back to b3 with dangerous attacking chances (see below for Botvinnik's demolition of Milan Vidmar at Nottingham 1936).
In the Slav: 2...c6 Botvinnik scored 86% with the mainline 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.e3 e6 5.Nc3 Nbd7 6.Bd3 dxc4 7.Bxc4 b5 8.Bd3.
He only faced 4...Bf5 once, winning with the somewhat unusual, but it has since been played by Karpov, Korchnoi and Kasparov, 5.Bd3!? Bxd3 6.Qxd3.
Against the Queen's Gambit Accepted: 2...dxc4 he scored 67% with another unusual line, 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Qa4+. The main line continues 4...c6 5.Qxc4 when White has good central control, and it does not prove easy for Black to successfully harass the white queen, for example the direct 5...Be6?! is considered doubtful because after 6.Qc2 g6 7.e4 Black is in danger of being overrun in the centre.
Black v 1.e4
Botvinnik scored 65% with the French Winawer: 1...e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4, rising to 79% in the mainline 4.e5 c5 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.bxc3 Ne7. Most of Botvinnik's opponents continued 7.Nf3, which he generally met with 7...Nbc6 8.a4 Bd7.
Perhaps surprisingly he only faced 7.Qg4 three times, at least according to Mega20, so it is difficult to give a repertoire recommendation but, for what it is worth, Botvinnik drew the one time he replied 7...Nf5 and scored a win and a loss with 7...cxd4.
A popular reply to the Winawer in Botvinnik's time was another line with Qg4, the sharp 4.a3 Bxc3+ 5.bxc3 dxe4 6.Qg4 Nf6 7.Qxg7 Rg8 8.Qh6 c5 9.Ne2, which he faced six times, scoring two wins and a draw with 9...Nc6.
Against the French Tarrasch: 3.Nd2 he scored 61% with 3...c5 in 14 games and 64% with 3...Nf6 in seven games, which makes it something of a toss-up from a repertoire viewpoint.
Against the Advance Variation: 3.e5 he scored 90% with the orthodox 5...c5.
He only faced the King's Indian Attack: 2.d3/Qe2 four times, but always went for an initial Sicilian set-up with 2...c5.
Black v 1.d4 and Others
Aim for a Nimxo-Indian: 1...Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4, after which Botvinnik scored 70% when meeting 4.e3 with 4...c5.
Against 4.Qc2, the most-popular continuation in his career, he scored 62% with 4...d5, generally replying to 5.cxd5 with 5...exd5.
Against 4.Nf3 he did best with 4...b6, and against 4.a3 Bxc3+ 5.bxc3 he played 5...c5.
The only other game in Mega20 featured 4.Qb3, which he met with 4...c5.
If White avoided the Nimzo-Indian by playing 3.Nf3, Botvinnik usually played the Queen's Indian: 3...b6, generally playing the main lines that follow 4.g3 Bb7 5.Bg2 Be7 6.0-0 0-0 7.Nc3 Ne4.
He faced 4.e3 and 4.Nc3 twice each, always playing 4...Bb7. However, thanks to a transposition, he reached the position after 4.Nc3 Bb7 5.Bg5 four times, doing best with 5...Be7.
Against 2.Nf3 Botvinnik scored 82% with the move that Alekhine was also very successful with, 2...b6.
Botvinnik varied against the English: 1.c4 but his most-popular reply was 1...Nf6, winning all three games that continued 2.Nc3 c5, and scoring 70% with 2.Nf3 c5. He only faced 2.g3 twice, drawing with 2...c6 3.Bg2 d5, but winning with 2...e5 3.Bg2 c6.
Against 1.Nf3 he liked 1...Nf6, transposing to English lines with 2.c4 c5, but generally copying White's moves after 2.g3, ie 2...g6 3.Bg2 Bg7 4.0-0 0-0. Four of the five games to reach this position saw 5.d3, which Botvinnik met three times with 5...c5 5.e4 Nc6.


Here is Botvinnik using his 7.Bd3!? weapon in the Queen's Gambit Declined.
Botvinnik - Milan Vidmar (Snr)
Nottingham 1936
1.c4 e6 2.Nf3 d5 3.d4 Nf6
Today this is generally considered a good move-order for Black since it avoids an Exchange Variation in which White has the option of Nge2.
4.Bg5 Be7 5.Nc3 0-0 6.e3 Nbd7 7.Bd3!?
As noted earlier the main move is 7.Rc1.

Position after 7.Bd3!?

*****
*****
*****
*****
*****
7...c5!?
The main line goes 7...dxc4 8.Bxc4 c5 9.0-0, when Black usually chooses between 9...a6 and 9...cxd4. After the latter the game Steve Bolduc (2200) - Spanton (-), World Open (Philadelphia) 1993 continued 10.exd4 Nd5!? (10...Nb6 is normal) 11.Bxe7 Nxe7 12.Re1 Nf6 with a roughly level game (½–½, 38 moves).
8.0-0 cxd4 9.exd4 dxc4 10.Bxc4
The game has transposed to the main line, as in Bolduc - Spanton. Vidmar continues with the move that was Black's chief reply then and still is today
10...Nb6 11.Bb3 Bd7 12.Qd3!?
As played by Lasker in one of his 1894 world-championship wins against Steinitz. The main line today is considered to be 12.Ne5 although this scores five percentage points fewer in Mega20.
12...Nbd5
Steinitz played 12...Rc8, but there are no other examples of this move in Mega20
13.Ne5 Bc6 14.Rad1!?
The 'obvious' 14.Bxc6, winning the bishop-pair and giving Black two queenside isolanis, was tried in a 2005 Bundesliga game, Dennis Breder (2454) - Rafael Fridman (2427), but that was prematurely agreed drawn after 14...bxc6 15.Rfd1 Rb8. Botvinnik seems to have decided the knight on e5 is stronger than the bishop on c6, or at least that the opportunity to play Nxc6 is not going to disappear any time soon.
14...Nb4?!
Hitting the black queen, but this only encourages White to switch it to the kingside, and meanwhile the knight has no influence on what quickly becomes the critical sector of the board. The analysis engines Stockfish11 and Komodo11.01 reckon White is only slightly better after, for example, 14...Rc8.
15.Qh3 Bd5!?
This leads to an exchange of minor pieces, which is generally beneficial to the side playing against an IQP, but after ...
16.Nxd5 Nbxd5?! 17.f4
... White has a strong attack. The engines reckon better was 16...Nfxd5, but agree 17.Bxe7 Qxe7 18.f4 is promising for White.
17...Rc8 18.f5 exf5 19.Rxf5
Apart from the rook on d1, White is massing against the black kingside, the strength of his position being obvious from the engines' main continuation, which involves giving up the exchange with 19...Rc6!?
19...Qd6 20.Nxf7! Rxf7 21.Bxf6 Bxf6 22.Rxd5 Qc6 23.Rd6 Qe8 24.Rd7 1-0
*Botvinnik first became world champion in a five-player 1948 tournament held to find someone to replace the deceased former title holder, Alekhine. He lost the title to Smyslov in 1957, won it back in 1958, lost it again to Tal in 1960 and won it back for the last time in 1961.