Williams Simon. The English Opening. Vol. 1

ChessBase, 2015.9/23/2015 – Simon Williams knows the English Opening - and loves it. After all it helped him to get his titles. He likes that you do not have to know much theory to play the opening and that White often can claim a space advantage. In his two DVDs about the English Williams now offers White a good, solid repertoire. Davide Nastasio looked at the first volume and was happy.Over the years I have looked at many videos by Simon Williams and even bought some of his books. He is an exceptionally passionate teacher and committed to the openings he plays and talks about. He likes the English Opening because, as he says in his introduction, it is extremely interesting, and an opening in which you do not need to know a lot of theory – you can navigate it safely if you know the main ideas.Now, while that may be arguable, I completely agree to another statement by Williams. He claims that, "if one learns the ideas and the setups, this opening is one in which theory doesn't change too drastically, and what one learns today will still be valuable ten, even twenty years from now."Williams, of course, is not the only grandmaster who likes the English. In fact, the opening is becoming more and more popular. While commentating some games of the Norway Chess tournament in Stavanger Hikaru Nakamura was asked why so many top players played the English with White. His answer was simple: "Because it is one of the most exciting openings..."In the first of his two DVDs on the English Williams uses an array of 22 top games to explain how White should play against 1...e5.