The Importance of Opening Theory

Professional chess players find it absolutely essential to keep up with current opening theory. It's even more important for chess book authors, producers of chess training videos and YouTubers, because that's how the earn their income.

How important is opening theory for club players then? To answer that, we must investigate what opening theory really is.

There's nothing scientific about it, so the word "theory" is misleading. It's really just a road map covering a huge number of well-trodden paths through the opening phase of the game. These paths are then organised into groups, usually defined the the first couple moves, and then named after the person who introduced it or the location where the opening was first played. The French Defence (1.e4 e6), the Ruy Lopez Opening (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc5 3.Bb5)  and the Grünfeld Defence (1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc5 d5) are just a few examples. The moves in bold are the characteristic moves that defines the opening.

From there it branches out in variations, sub variations and sidelines. Some have names of there own (like the Najdorf Sicilian and the Ruy Lopez, Marshall Attack). Some popular variations cover 20 moves or more, reaching well into the middle game. 

The amount of information covered by opening theory is absolutely overwhelming. To narrow it down most players focus on just a few lines as White and as Black, and memorise those. This works well for Grandmasters, but for club players, is a complete waste of time. Here's why:

A Grandmaster knows what's in fashion at the moment, and what their opponents usually play. When faced with an unexpected move, a GM has a deep understanding of the position at hand, and can now start working out the continuation.

At the club level, anything can happen at any time, and it usually does - around move three or so. At that point, your memorised lines are useless. Since club players are notoriously bad at assessing unfamiliar positions, the game can now take off an any direction, most of them bad.

In this example, my opponent was a booked-up teenager with the White pieces:

1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.ex4 cxd4 4.Nc3 Nf6 5.Bf4

White is threatening Nc3-b5-c7 winning the rook. This can be parried in several ways, but I decided on:

5...a6 

This avoids any unpleasantries on b5, and also prepares for a future pawn push to b5. The position is about equal, without immediate threats, and both players can now proceed with the development of their pieces.

After the game, my opponent told me he was completely taken aback by that move, and said disappointedly "that's not how they play the Caro-Kann". He never recovered from the shock, and proceeded to make several mistakes, arriving at a completely lost position by move 13. 

Back home, I learned that 4.Nc3 is frowned upon by theory, c4 or Bd3 are the popular choices. Also, 5...a6 is actually the main line here, so my opponent had probably mixed up the variations. I knew nothing about any of that at the time of the game, but those fine nuances are not important at this level.

Takeaway

Get rid of that habit of memorising opening lines. They will not do you any good. Instead, focus on understanding the positions that arise from your openings, and the ideas behind them.