How to play the Pterodactyl Chess Opening | Beef Eater Variation

The Pterodactyl, Beef eater variation is an incredibly strange opening. Not just the name, the moves break several fundamental chess principles. Despite this, it still is a great opening, especially if you want to surprise your opponents.

Opening moves

It starts with the moves: 1. d4 g6 2. c4 Bg7 3. Nc6 c5

So far it is not too far from normal play. The only chess principle not being followed is to control the center with your pawns. Instead, black is putting the bishop on the long diagonal fianchettoed, in hopes to attack whites center instead. You can see with the move c5, black is already threating to capture the d pawn.

The following moves are when things get strange: 4. Bxc6 bxc6 5. f5

Now we are violating several chess principles, all in just 2 moves. Generally:

• You shouldn't move a piece twice out of the opening
• Bishops are slightly better than knights, so should not be traded without good reason
• Trading your finachettoed bishop leaves your king weak
• Pushing your f pawn leaves your king weak

The reason we can afford to do this, is because the double isolated pawns for white on the c file are incredibly awkward to defend. Also, despite these moves normally being quite dangerous in terms of king safety, if you keep the position closed, your king will be okay. This is the reason for pushing f5, as it makes e4 for white difficult.

Middlegame Plan

The plan in the middle game is to try and attack white's pawns on the c file. You can either attack the pawn on c3, or c4, depending on how black defends. Your queen often belongs on a5 to assist in this process. Often, your king will stay in the center of the board. It is important to keep files closed to keep your king safe in the center. Here is an example of a potential position out of the middle game. In this spot, the best move is Qa4, shifting your pressure to the c4 pawn.

Another example is one taken from a game featuring Grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura. You can see he has kept the position closed, kept pressure on c3 and c4, and is now about to win the c4 pawn.

If you would like to see this opening in more detail, you can see my youtube video featuring Hikaru's game here