Lopez Opening Lopez Opening The Lopez Opening (or MacLeod Attack) is a chess opening characterized by the moves: The opening was played frequently by 19th century Scottish–Canadian chess master Nicholas MacLeod but has otherwise arisen rarely in tournament play. White's second move prepares to push a pawn to d4, establishing a strong center. Play can potentially transpose to other openings, most likely the Ponziani Opening or the Göring Gambit in the Scotch Game. However, Eric Schiller states in "Unorthodox Chess Openings" that the opening is too slow; that Black can respond vigorously with 2...d5! to eliminate transpositional possibilities and solve all of
Ruy Lopez especially if Black plays ...Bb7. White usually plays 9.h3 instead of 9.d4 (the Yates Variation) because after 9.d4 Bg4 (the Bogoljubow Variation), the pin of the white is troublesome. The variation takes its name from the game Capablanca–Bogoljubow, London 1922. The Chigorin Variation was refined by Mikhail Chigorin around the turn of the 20th century and became the primary Black defence to the Ruy Lopez for more than fifty years. With 9...Na5 Black chases the white bishop from the a2–g8 diagonal and frees the c-pawn for queenside expansion. After 10.Bc2 c5 11.d4 the classical Black follow up is 11...Qc7, reinforcing