1.e3 is a move which has not been played a great deal and when it has been played it has been used primarily as a transpositional tool. After 1.e3 both players can find themselves transposing into many different openings. Often black does best not to fall in with simple transpositions and to aim for positions which are quite like mainline openings except that white’s e-pawn is committed to e3 when it would rather not be. Reader beware (!) much of what follows is pure analysis with virtually no game references. For this reason the material should be treated with extreme caution. Without practical tests a variation has no pedigree and so may turn out to be bad. If you want to try any of these lines out in serious games make sure you examine them carefully and try them out against a PC and in some blitz games first!

First, here is a selection of transpositional possibilities to give you an idea of how ‘flexible’ 1. e3 can be.

1. e3

A) 1. ... e5
A1) 2. d4 ed 3. ed d5 – French Defence Exchange Variation
A2) 2. c4 – English Opening, Reversed Sicilian
A3) 2. b3 – Nimzowitch-Larsen Attack

B) 1. ... d5
B1) 2. d4 Nf6
B11) 3. Nf3– Colle Opening
B12) 3. f4 – Stonewall Opening
B13) 3. c4
B131) 3. ... c6?! 4. Nf3 – Slav Defence
B132) 3. ... e6 4. Nc3 Bb4?! – Nimzo-Indian Defence, Rubinstein Variation.
B2) 2. f4 – Birds Opening
B3) 2. b3 – Nimzowitch-Larsen Attack
B4) 2. b4 – St. George Opening

C) 1. ... Nf6
C1) 2. d4 d5
C11) 3. Nf3 – Colle Opening
C12) 3. f4 – Stonewall Opening
C2) 2. c4
C21) 2. ... e5 – English Opening – Reversed Sicilian
C22) 2. ... c5 – Symmetrical English
C3) 2. b3 – Nimzowitch-Larsen Attack
C4) 2. b4 – St. George Opening

Naturally, there is a great deal of potential for reversed openings after 1. e3. For example, after 1. e3 e5 white could play 2. e4?! with a reversed kings pawn opening. 2. ... Nf6 3. Nf3 would be a reversed Petroff while 3. Nc3 Bb4 would be a reversed Spanish. Equally, after 1. e3 c5 white could play 2. e4?! and we have a Reversed English Reversed Sicilian!

However, the line which gives 1. e3 its real significance is probably 1. e3 d5 2. c4 as played by Kasparov against Fritz (three times) in 1994. All three games continued 2. .. dc 3. Bxc4 e5. Twice Gazza transposed to the only interesting variation of the Exchange French with 4. d4 ed 5. ed but once, he played the more interesting 4. Nc3. The game continued 4. Nc6 5. Nf3. Here Fritz played the decidedly dodgy looking 5. .. f5?! and after 6. Qb3! was in some trouble. The reason this position is interesting is that white can hold back the d2-d4 advance until it will be more effective, or even not play it at all. The position is unlike those arising from the English in that white, instead of fianchettoing his king’s bishop or developing it to e2, has developed it to a more active square (at least in the short term) – c4.

After 1. e3 d5 2. c4 black might also try 2. ... d4. If black meets 3. Nf3 with 3. ... c5 then we will have reached a reversed Benoni which should be very playable for white. If, on the other hand black meets 3. Nf3 with 3. ... Nc6 then white might like to consider playing the fascinating looking 4. b4?!. Play might continue 4. ... de 5. fe Nxb4 6. Qa4+ Nc6 7. d4 Bd7 8. Qb3 when white has some compensation for the pawn. If white chooses instead 3. ed then black would do best to avoid 3. ... Qxd4 4. Nf3 Qe4+?! 5. Be2 Nf6 6. Nc3 += and should instead allow a transposition to an Exchange French with 3. ... e6 4. Nf3 Nc6 5. Nc3 Nf6 6. d5 ed 7. d4.

Black has one other significant option after 1. e3 d5 2. c4 and that is 2. ... c6. Obviously white can transpose to a very quiet line of the Slav with 3. d4, or play into a Reti with 3. Nf3. However, white could also try the relatively untested 3. f4(?!), which although possibly dubious, is quite an interesting try. If black flicks in the tricky 3. ... e5 then white should probably play 4. fe dc 5. Nf3 (not 5. Bxc4 Qh4+ winning the bishop on c4) 5. ... Bg4 (5. ... Be6 6. b3! cb 7. ab Bb4 [to prevent d2-d4] 8. Ba3! =/+=) 6. Bxc4 Bxf3 7. Bxf7+ Kxf7 8. Qxf3+ Ke8 9. O-O =/+=. Alternatively, black could play more simply with 3. ... Nf6 4. Nf3 Bf5. Apart from transposing to a kind of Stonewall with 5. d4, white might think about simple development with Be2, b3, Bb2 etc. which has been seen in practice a couple of times, or consider playing more riskily with 5. b4?! which, though probably not sound, is still quite interesting. The idea of course is to provoke black into breaking open the queenside with moves like a5 and b5. Whether this is a good idea of course is quite another matter! A sample line goes 5. b4?! e6 6. a3 dc?! 7. Bxc4 b5 8. Be2 a5 9. ba Qxa5 10. Bb2 =

As has already been mentioned, there are very few games in existence in which 1. e3 was played, and even fewer with any of the slightly whacky ideas we have suggested above. Just to have some material to work with we have placed four training games into a PGN file with a few opening references. You can download the file here. As always with files from this site, if you choose to download this file and/or make use of its contents, whatsoever use that may be, then you do so at your own risk. (It's sad that we have to slap this kind of disclaimer on our pages.)

We hope this material is of some interest and that looking through it does your chess no harm.