Sicilian Defence: Main Lines, Plans and Which to Play

The Sicilian Defence is the reply 1...c5 to 1.e4: rather than copying White's move, Black controls d4 with a flank pawn and goes for an unbalanced position from move one. It is the most played and most analysed defence to 1.e4, and the one widely considered to give Black the best winning chances.

Its history is a long one. The Italian Giulio Polerio was already analysing it in a manuscript of 1594, and the English name was fixed by Jacob Sarratt in 1813. For much of the nineteenth century it had a poor reputation —Steinitz, the first world champion, preferred 1...e5— and it was rehabilitated in the middle of the twentieth century by players such as Botvinnik, Bronstein and Miguel Najdorf. Fischer and Kasparov later made it their main weapon with Black.

This article is the map: what each side wants and what the big families of lines are, so you know where you stand. The most famous line of all has its own guide, the Sicilian Najdorf.

The idea in one sentence

Black trades a flank pawn for a central one, and accepts being behind in development in return for a structure that pays off in the long run. You can see it in the main line, the Open Sicilian:

After the exchange Black has two central pawns —on d6 and e7— against White's one, plus the half-open c-file for the rooks. White, in return, has more space, a well-centralised knight on d4 and quicker development. Almost everything in the Sicilian follows from that: White has to do something with the lead before it evaporates, and Black has to survive it to reach a middlegame —or an endgame— where the structure counts.

What each side wants

Black:

• Counterplay on the queenside: ...a6, ...b5, rooks on the c-file.
• The exchange sacrifice on c3 (...Rxc3), a theme that turns up in almost every line to wreck White's castled king or pawn structure.
• A fight for d5, with ...e6 or with ...e5 depending on the variation.

White:

• Use the development and space: kingside pawn storms with f4 and g4, often with opposite-side castling.
• Central tactics while Black's king is still on e8: sacrifices on d5, e6 or b5.
• If Black plays ...e5, plant a knight on d5.

The Open Sicilian: Black's second move decides

Against 2.Nf3 Black chooses between three moves, and each one leads to a different family.

With 2...d6: Najdorf, Dragon, Classical and Scheveningen

This is the largest family. The Najdorf, with 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6, is the queen of the Sicilian: 5...a6 controls b5 and postpones the decision about the centre. It has six main systems, and its own guide covers them.

The Dragon puts the bishop on g7, aiming down the long diagonal at d4 and b2. The most dangerous answer is the Yugoslav Attack:

White castles queenside, pushes h4-h5 to open the h-file and looks to trade off the g7 bishop with Bh6. Black attacks on the other wing with ...Rc8, ...Ne5 and, very often, ...Rxc3. It is a race: whoever arrives first wins, and the theory is extremely forcing.

The Classical, with 5...Nc6, invites the Richter-Rauzer Attack (6.Bg5), which pins the knight and takes the Dragon option away from Black. The Scheveningen, with 5...e6, builds a small, solid centre with pawns on d6 and e6; its sternest test is the Keres Attack, 6.g4, which kicks the f6 knight with g5.

With 2...Nc6: Sveshnikov, Kalashnikov and Accelerated Dragon

The Sveshnikov is the Sicilian of broken principles. Black plays ...e5, accepts a backward pawn on d6 and a hole on d5, and gains time and activity in return:

The doubled f-pawns look ugly and are not: with ...f5 Black hits White's centre, keeps the bishop pair, and the knight on a3 is far from the action. White stakes everything on d5. The Kalashnikov (4...e5 5.Nb5 d6) uses the same structure with a different move order.

The Accelerated Dragon (4...g6) puts the bishop on g7 without going through ...d6, so Black can break with ...d5 in a single move. The most serious reply is the Maróczy Bind, 5.c4: two pawns on c4 and e4 that control d5 and leave Black with little space and plenty of patience ahead.

With 2...e6: Taimanov and Kan

These are the flexible Sicilians. Black does not yet commit the king's knight or the d-pawn, and adapts the set-up to whatever White does. The Taimanov brings out the queen's knight first:

The queen on c7 covers e5, Black follows up with ...a6 and later chooses between ...Nf6, ...b5 or a Scheveningen structure. The Kan —which some books call the Paulsen— plays 4...a6 and keeps even more options open: it can end up in a Hedgehog formation, with the pawns on the sixth rank waiting for the right moment to break with ...b5 or ...d5.

They demand less forcing theory than the Dragon or the Najdorf and are understood through plans more than moves. That makes them a good way into the Sicilian.

The anti-Sicilians: when White doesn't open up

Plenty of White players do not want to argue Open Sicilian theory and take another road on move two or three. At club level they turn up constantly, so any repertoire built on the Sicilian needs an answer to each of them.

• Alapin (2.c3). Prepares d4 so White can recapture with a pawn and keep a two-pawn centre. Black replies 2...Nf6 (after 3.e5 Nd5 the knight is a nuisance in the centre) or 2...d5, where the queen that recaptures on d5 cannot be hit by a knight from c3, because the pawn is sitting there.
• Rossolimo (2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5) and Moscow (2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+). The bishop comes out before the centre opens; in the Rossolimo White often takes on c6 to double Black's pawns. Slow, manoeuvring games, very common at the top level.
• Closed (2.Nc3). White plays g3, Bg2, d3 and often f4, with a slow kingside attack. It was one of Boris Spassky's weapons.
• Grand Prix (2.f4, or 2.Nc3 and 3.f4). The direct version: f4-f5 and an attack on the king.
• Smith-Morra Gambit (2.d4 cxd4 3.c3). A pawn for development:

White continues with Nf3, Bc4, castling and rooks on c1 and d1, aiming at the open files. With accurate defence Black is fine, but in faster games White's development wins a great many games. Black can also decline it with 3...Nf6 or 3...d3.

Typical mistakes

• Preparing only the Open Sicilian. Learning ten moves of the Najdorf and having nothing against 2.c3 or the Morra is the most common mistake of anyone taking up the Sicilian: at a club tournament you will meet more anti-Sicilians than main lines.
• Delaying counterplay. If Black does nothing on the queenside, White's attack on the other wing simply arrives.
• Leaving the king in the centre one move too long. Black castles late in many lines, and the sacrifices on d5, e6 or b5 exist precisely to punish that.
• With ...e5, giving up d5 for nothing. In the Sveshnikov and the Kalashnikov the hole is paid for with activity; if the activity is not there, a white knight on d5 decides the game.
• With White, playing the Open Sicilian without attacking. The lead in development is short-lived. If White plays quietly, the resulting structure favours Black.

Which Sicilian should you play?

It depends on your style and how much study time you have:

• If you like calculating and theory doesn't scare you: the Najdorf or the Dragon. They are the most ambitious and the most demanding to prepare.
• If you like concrete structures: the Sveshnikov. The weaknesses are always the same and the plans repeat from game to game.
• If you want to play the Sicilian without living in theory: the Taimanov or the Kan, which adapt to whatever White does.

And if what you want against 1.e4 is a healthy position rather than a fight, the Sicilian may not be for you: the Caro-Kann Defence and the French are the classical alternatives. To decide sensibly, it helps to read how to choose an opening that suits the way you play.

How to study it

One Sicilian at a time. Choose your second move first —2...d6, 2...Nc6 or 2...e6— because that decides which anti-Sicilians you will face: 2...d6 brings the Moscow, 2...Nc6 the Rossolimo, and against 2...e6 many White players opt for a King's Indian Attack set-up with d3, g3 and Bg2. Then prepare an answer to the Alapin and the Morra, which apply to all of them.

What pays off most is not memorising but understanding the structures: the small centre of the Scheveningen, the Maróczy Bind, the d5 hole in the Sveshnikov, the race of attacks in the Dragon. With those, most moves find themselves, and what doesn't you will discover by reviewing your games. You do not need to memorise pages of theory for that.

The catalogue has material for almost every family. Sicilian Najdorf in Depth devotes a class to each of the Najdorf's six systems. Master Chess: Attack, Openings and Endgames has a class on the pros and cons of the Sveshnikov, and in Creativity and Calculation with Alexei Shirov Shirov himself explains the attack in a Sicilian Dragon. Masters in Action has a class on the Paulsen Sicilian, and the Sicilians with ...e6 and with ...e5 have their own classes in Strategy, Sacrifices and Openings, in Evaluation, Structures and Attack and in Repertoire and Strategy. The lessons are in Spanish with English subtitles. And if you want to see openings worked through live, there is a weekly group class devoted to them.