More complicated Euwe defenses

In  June last year ( yes, already more than one year ago ), I covered some lines on the refutation of the refutation, occuring after 1.d4 d5 2.e4 dxe4 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.f3 exf3 5.Nxf3 e6 6.Bg5 c5 7.Bxf6 Qxf6 8.Bb5+. In my earlier blog , I indicated that both players have chances after 8...Bd7 9.Ne5.

Today, I will cover another, related line, when black blocks the check with the knight, eg 8...Nd7 and 8...Nc6.

After 8...Nc6, white simply develops with 9.00 (diagram) and the black queen finds itself in the firing line (+-)

Now that we have dismissed 8...Nc6, let's look a bit closer on 8...Nd7. I had considered 9.00 before, but it seems to me this brings nothing as 9...cxd4 10.Ne4 and black has the fantastic 10...Qf5 (diagram)

It seems that white has no advantage at all in this position, eg 11.Bxd7+ Bxd5 12.Nfg5 Qd5 13.Nxf7 Qxe4 14.Nxh8 Bc6 with complete equality. Now it is unlike that your opponent will find this great queenmove, but is there nothing better than 9.00 ??

Let's look at 9.Ne5 if this move gives an advantage.

It seems to me that 9...Bd6 gives black a completely equal game, eg 10.Nxd7 Bxd7 11.Bxd7+ Kxd7 12.Rf1 Qh4+ 13.Rf2

So I have to conclude that 6...c5 7.Bxf6 Qxf7 8.Bb5+ does not give any advantage to white as both 8...Bd7 and 8...Nd7 offer vlack a completely equal game. Maybe 8.d5 is better, but that's for another day