How to play against the Noteboom variation?

Question

In online games I sometimes have this happen:

[fen ""]

1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 e6 4.Nc3 dxc4

and Black plays the famous "Noteboom variation". I checked my database and I have in fact lost every single game as White where this variation happened. Usually Black just arranges his pieces nicely and pushes the a-pawn and b-pawn and I lose material due to pieces getting trapped in the corner, or having to give up pieces to stop the pawns promoting.

What is a promising way to meet this system for White?

Note: Of course, I could avoid the line with 4.e3 going into a normal Meran. But I often play quickly the first few moves of an internet game and carelessly make a natural developing move with the knight. It would be good to know how to recover from this.

Answer 1

In this variation, black is behind development after

[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[WhiteELO "?"]
[BlackELO "?"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqkbnr/pp3ppp/2p1p3/8/2pP4/2N2N2/PP2PPPP/R1BQKB1R w KQkq - 0 1"]


1. Bf4 Bb4 2. e3 Bxc3+ 3. bxc3 b5 4. a4 Nf6 5. axb5 cxb5 6. Rb1

White has more center control, and black will probably have a backward pawn if he tries to hang onto c4.

Another variation I like is

[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[WhiteELO "?"]
[BlackELO "?"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "rnbqkbnr/pp3ppp/2p1p3/8/2pP4/2N2N2/PP2PPPP/R1BQKB1R w KQkq - 0 1"]

1. e3 b5 2. b3 Bb4 3. Bb2 cxb3 4. Qxb3 Bxc3 5. Qxc3 Nf6 6. Bd3

which creates lots of attacking chances for white.

Answer 2

In order to avoid the sharp positions where black has the connected passed a- and b-pawns, white can switch to systems with g3. This is what white opted for in Nakamura-Ivanchuk and Giri-Caruana.

In the first game, Nakamura played 5.g3. If black replies with 5....Nf6, then the game transposes to a theoretical line that arises after 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Nc3 e6 5.g3 dxc4. Instead, Ivanchuk tried to postpone Nf6 and played 5....b5 6.Bg2 Bb7 7.Ne5 Qc8. However, it seems that Nakamura was able to develop a dangerous initiative.

In the second game, Giri first played 5.a4 and after 5....Bb4, he went for 6.g3, probably hoping for a good version of the 5.g3 variation.

      [FEN ""]
      [StartPly "8"]

      1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 e6 (3...Nf6 4.Nc3 e6 5.g3 dxc4) 4.Nc3 dxc4 5.a4 (5.g3 Nf6) Bb4 6.g3

Answer 3

Without knowing your playing style, answering this question is difficult.

As a 2000 who plays this defense, the line I have the most trouble with is the Nd2 line.

1 d4 d5 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 c6 4 Nf3 dxc4 5 a4 Bb4 6 e3 b5 7, Bd2 a5 8 axb5 Bxc3 9 Bc3 cxb5 10 b3 Bb7 11 bxc4 b4 12 Bb2 Nf6 13 Bd3 Nbbd7 14 o-o o-o 15 Nd2 (or Bc2 followed by Nd3.) ["The Triangle System" by Sherbakov is a good reference book.]

A good plan would be to switch to the Catalan after Black weakens the long diagonal.