Scandinavian Defense With 3...Qd6 (Gubinsky-Melts Defense)

The Qd6 Scandinavian is the least popular variation after Nc3, and it has only recently become a respectable opening!

Mainly thanks to the work of Michael Melts, who wrote a book on the Qd6 Scandinavian, has the opening become theoretically well known. Before that, with the exception of the great David Bronstein, no strong grandmaster took it seriously.

In the early 2000s, after Melts’ book came out, the opening began being popular, and it took off after GM Sergei Tiviakov started playing it as one of his main defenses to e4. Since then, Qd6 has earned its right as a normal defense to Nc3, and is now considered just as strong as Qa5 and Qd8.

There are obvious upsides and downsides to choosing d6 instead of d8 or a5. Qd8 is the safest move, and perhaps (at least in my opinion) the most sensible one. You move the queen in advance of the tempo gains which are bound to come. Qa5 is the most active move. It pins the c3 knight and leaves the queen “developed”, but is also provocative and the queen is going to have to move almost certainly. Qd6 is somewhere in the middle. Not leaving the queen out in the open, but still giving white a chance to harass it.

Instead of Bd2 and b4 in the Qa5 lines, here the queen is vulnerable to Nb5 and especially Bf4. These two moves are why no one took the defense seriously until it has been thoroughly theoretically proven that black is fine despite white having those options.

Yes, white will be up in development and have more space, but black’s position is solid, flexible and perfectly playable. Sergei Tiviakov scored 4.5/6 in the first six games in which he employed the Qd6 Scandinavian!

Another key thing is that most plans from a5 and d8 lines don’t really work against Qd6, which makes it a great weapon for confusing white!

Here are Tiviakov’s games in the opening. Studying them should give you a much better idea of what the opening is about (you can find all the games on chessgames . com):

Black wins:

Gata Kamsky vs Sergei Tiviakov, 2006 Wijk aan Zee
Surya Shekhar Ganguly vs Sergei Tiviakov, 2007 World Cup
Gu Xiaobing vs Sergei Tiviakov, 2017 Srefidensi Masters

And some unfavorable results:

Peter Svidler vs Sergei Tiviakov, 2007 Wijk aan Zee (draw)
David Howell vs Sergei Tiviakov, 2007 Canadian Open (draw)
Alexey Shirov vs Sergei Tiviakov, 2008 Benidorm (white won)

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