Van't Kruijs Opening

The opening 1.e3 is not popular. According to ChessBase, it ranks eleventh in popularity out of the twenty possible first moves. It releases the king's bishop, and makes a modest claim in the centre, but the move is somewhat passive. The queen's bishop's development is somewhat hindered by the pawn on e3, and White usually wants to take more than a modest stake of the centre.

Although not very aggressive for a first move, play may transpose to lines of the English Opening (c2–c4), Queen's Pawn Game (d2–d4), or reversed French Defence (delayed d2–d4), reversed Dutch Defence (f2–f4) positions or the modern variation of Larsen's Opening (b2-b3).

There are a few experimental moves that can be tried, however. For example, after 1.e3 e5, White can play 2.e4!?, therefore making it a truly reversed king's pawn opening. This is often used when White has much knowledge of the opening when playing as Black. Therefore, this can be used to ensnare a few opponents into traps. Since this gives the first move advantage to Black straightaway, however, this is not recommended. Similarly, 1.e3 f5 2.e4 goes to a reversed From's Gambit, where White is practically playing as Black.

The Van't Kruijs Opening is not a common choice for grandmasters, but its ability to transpose into many different openings explains its attraction for some players such as the Czech grandmaster Pavel Blatny, Aron Nimzowitsch,[2] and Bent Larsen. Garry Kasparov has used the move against the Fritz chess engine to get it "out of book".

• List of chess openings
• List of chess openings named after people

• Hooper, David; Whyld, Kenneth (1996). The Oxford Companion to Chess. Oxford University. ISBN 0-19-280049-3.
• Dunnington, Angus (2000). Winning Unorthodox Openings. Everyman Chess. ISBN 978-1-85744-285-4.

The Wikibook Chess Opening Theory has a page on the topic of: Van't Kruijs Opening

• Short biography of Maarten van't Kruijs
• The chess games of Maarten Van't Kruijs