Has the dragon variation of the Sicilian defense lost favor to the Najdorf variation? I rarely see a fianchettoed bishop in the Najdorf defense.
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I played it in my youth (70's), from both sides. My opinion now is that it is spent from the black side, which is why you don't see it very often at top level chess. The Yugoslav Attack is ferocious if not defended against correctly. Truly, one misstep by black and he can be mated. On the other hand, if black survives he generally has a better endgame. But, I think black can do better using other variations in the Sicilian Defense.– PriyomeCommented May 11, 2017 at 12:09
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1 Answer
The Dragon Variation of Sicilian is complex and difficult to defend sometimes against White's ferocious King side attack. I will recommend Dragon to those Players only who are not timid enough to sacrifice material against activity. Since in Dragon normal theory Black does a Castling with his fianchettoed Bishop & the g6 pawn is hooked to White's h5 pawn sacrifice.
Unlike Najdorf where White also attacks mostly on K-side but Black has equally good chances to attack White on the Q-side since with a6 on move 5th b5 from Black comes faster and dislodges the Knight on c3. In Dragon the attack from Black is somewhat slow compared to Najdorf.
In Najdorf there is one variation where Black does a Fianchetto also. Below is the variation:
[FEN ""]
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.f4 g6
and with any other move from White like Qf3 or Be2 Black puts his Bishop on g7 .
