IM Valeri Lilov and the Anti-1.d4 Without 2.c4 Problem: Seven Systems in Six Videos

One November evening, in the playing hall of an amateur tournament in Shanghai, I sat behind board seven and counted. The game opened 1.d4 d5 2.Nf3. White did not play 2.c4. By move twelve the position had a familiar shape: White's bishop on f4, pawn on e3, knight on f3, bishop on d3, king safely castled. The player with Black, a young man of maybe twenty-two, bit his lip, pushed his pawn to c6 and then c7-c5. Eighteen moves later he signed the scoresheet. I asked him what preparation he had for that system. He said: I thought it was easy to play.

Back home I opened my personal database. Within the group of games rated between 1600 and 2026 that I have logged over six years, the share of White players choosing the London System or the Colle System after 1.d4 d5 has risen steadily season after season. That number is not shocking. What is shocking sits on the other side of the board: most Black players have never spent a single evening learning a concrete plan against these systems. They study the Slav, the Semi-Slav, the Queen's Gambit. Then the opponent puts a system on the board that was never in their book.

That is precisely the gap a new product is aiming at.

IM Valeri Lilov, a Bulgarian trainer, has released six instructional videos building a plan for Black against the systems White uses to dodge the heavy theory of 1.d4 d5. The product sits inside a series called Power of Initiative, labelled episode 21. The material is advertised as covering seven systems: the Colle System, the Trompowsky Attack, the Torre Attack, the London System, the Catalan, the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit and the Richter-Veresov.

On the surface, this is a sensible product. Put it on the scale of data, though, and a few things need scrutiny.

First, the theoretical context it inserts itself into. After 1.d4 d5, if White plays 2.c4, the game walks into an enormous theoretical forest: the Slav, the Semi-Slav, the Queen's Gambit Accepted, the Orthodox Queen's Gambit. These are systems analysed to move twenty-five, thirty, sometimes into the endgame. An ordinary amateur simply does not have the time to memorise them, let alone understand them. So a large share of White players take the simpler route: no 2.c4.

They switch to the Colle, the London, the Torre, the Trompowsky. These systems share one trait: few branches, clear plans, little dependence on memory. White builds a stable pawn structure, places pieces on sensible squares, and plays the middlegame on positional understanding. For a busy amateur, that is a rational choice in terms of time cost.

Black, facing that choice, is pushed into a passive position in terms of preparation. He must prepare against seven different systems while the opponent only needs to prepare one.

That is a structural asymmetry, and it is the crux of the whole story. It is not that any of those seven systems is strong. It is that the preparation cost on the two sides is not equal.

Lilov, as described, offers a practical plan for Black for each system. The approach points in the right direction: at club level nobody needs a novelty on move eighteen. They need to know where the pawns go, where the bishops go, and when to strike at the centre.

Take the London System. White develops the bishop to f4 before closing with e3, knight to f3, pawn to e3, bishop to d3, knight to bd2, short castling. This is the classic pyramid structure. Black's natural plan runs along a few lines: push the pawn to c5 to hit the centre, place a knight on f6 and the other on d7 or c6, bring a bishop to f5 or g4 to contest e4, and most importantly never allow White the leisure to play e3-e4 comfortably.

With the Colle System the picture is similar but the tempo differs. The Colle is slower and its intention clearer: White wants to push e4 and open the d3 bishop toward the kingside. Black can blunt that intention by controlling e4 with pawns and pieces, or simply accept e4 and counterattack the now-open centre.

The Torre Attack is different in nature. White brings the bishop to g5 early, presses on the f6 knight, and tries to spoil Black's pawn structure before Black settles. Defensive plans here revolve around keeping the knight pair flexible and preventing the pawn structure from being locked.

The Trompowsky Attack is the most contentious of the group. The bishop goes to g5 on move two, ready to trade itself for a knight to create doubled pawns or wreck the structure. Handling the Trompowsky demands an early structural decision: accept or decline the bishop trade. Choose the wrong direction and Black can end up squeezed within twenty moves.

The remaining three systems, the Catalan, the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit and the Richter-Veresov, belong to entirely different philosophical families. The Catalan is a closed system where White places the bishop on g2 and exerts long-term pressure on the queenside. The Blackmar-Diemer is a pawn sacrifice for the centre, highly tactical in character. The Richter-Veresov is rare, with White using knights and the bishop to press the centre, sometimes targeting Black's hanging pawns.

Cramming seven systems into six videos is a notable structural choice. On average, each system gets less than one video. For the Catalan or the Trompowsky, that amount of time is only enough to sketch the main outlines, not to handle the side branches an opponent might choose.

This is where the packaging deserves a question. The promotional title mentions the Benko Gambit, but the Benko Gambit arises after 1.d4 Nf6, not after 1.d4 d5. None of the seven systems listed in the content is the Benko Gambit. Most likely this is a search-optimisation decision: a player typing Benko Gambit into a search box finds this product, then discovers the broader series.

That is a legitimate commercial tactic. It is also a signal about the priority given to content versus marketing inside the product.

As for Lilov, the published information stops at Bulgarian trainer with the International Master title. No current rating, no student record, no recent tournament data. For a product selling opening knowledge, that is a meaningful gap. Not because an IM title is insufficient for teaching, but because a buyer has no way to assess quality before paying.

No win rates, no engine evaluations, no sample games, no user reviews. The entire basis for evaluating this product, as of now, is the seller's own description.

That is the structural weakness of nearly the whole opening-content market at IM level. At the top tier, leading players such as Vladimir Kramnik, Peter Svidler or Boris Gelfand sell preparation at a different level altogether: reference games, engine analysis, tournament data. In the middle tier where Lilov operates, products are usually packaged more pragmatically: plans, structures, ideas.

The distance between those two tiers is not in the content. It is in verifiability.

One more thing needs saying about the extremely dangerous framing. The London System, the Colle System, the Torre Attack are solid systems at club level, but nobody places them among the most dangerous openings at the top. The London gives White a stable position, not a winning one. The Colle has long been considered somewhat passive when Black plays correctly. The Torre leads to strategic positions rather than direct attacks.

Calling them extremely dangerous serves a specific purpose: creating urgency. If a buyer believes the opponent is holding a lethal weapon, he pays for a solution. If he understands the opponent is merely holding a solid but limited system, the incentive to buy drops sharply.

I once believed in feeling, until a number knocked on my door at 3 a.m.

The number in this case does not sit on Lilov's side. It sits on the learner's side. Across six years of my notes, the Black players losing games against the London and the Colle did not lose from a lack of variations. They lost to specific habits: pushing c6 too early when there was no need, leaving the knight on g8 too long, letting White control e4 without contesting it, and trading pieces passively when the position demanded initiative.

Put differently, the problem is not missing opening knowledge. The problem is missing a middlegame plan tied to the pawn structure.

A product teaching practical plans could address exactly that. But to do so it must teach concretely, with structure and examples. That is something a short description cannot prove.

There is another paradox worth noting. The volume of free content on beating the London, the Colle and the Torre on YouTube, Lichess and chess forums is enormous. A serious student could spend three evenings and collect enough raw material to build a plan. So where does the real value of a paid course lie?

The answer lies in structure. Free material is scattered, unordered, makes no distinction about which system matters first, and rarely shows the connections between systems. A well-edited course can save dozens of hours of filtering.

But the price of saved time must be measured in editorial quality. With six videos for seven systems, average depth per system is mathematically constrained. That is a structural problem, not a competence problem.

The transfer market does not buy the past. It buys what the data has forgiven.

The opening-content market runs on similar logic, but in the opposite direction. It sells plans, yet it collects money on fear. And like free-agent contracts, the hidden cost never appears in the headline figure. For a chess student, the hidden cost is time, a resource that cannot be refunded.

Based on my experience following games at amateur tournaments over many years, I keep seeing the same pattern. A student buys a course, watches it all in a week, feels satisfied, and three months later still makes the same mistakes inside the same pawn structure. Opening knowledge does not automatically turn into correct decisions on move fifteen.

There are players the world forgets, but the data never forgets them.

Here, the forgotten figures are not the Black players at the board. They are the opening systems filed away as unimportant: the Richter-Veresov, the Blackmar-Diemer, the Trompowsky. While opening media pours attention into main lines of the Sicilian or the Najdorf, these systems quietly decide the outcome of countless club games.

A serious product about them has a reason to exist. What is still missing is evidence that this product is serious.

It is worth noting that a series reaching episode 21 suggests a durable business model: building a curriculum episode by episode and retaining students across multiple purchases. That model is well proven in the chess education market. It is not a bad sign. It is simply a sign that we are looking at a commercial product, not a research paper.

When the stadium empties, the true value of a person starts to speak.

In chess, the empty-stadium moment is the moment with no spectators and no commentators, only the player in front of the board and the clock. In that moment the only thing that helps is a plan he understands, not a list of variations he remembers.

If Lilov's six videos teach that, they have value. If they merely hand over a list of plans to memorise, they will end up in the same drawer as hundreds of free videos.

I light candles for data. But I always let the flame of emotion light the question.

And the data, in this case, has not spoken yet. Six videos, seven systems, not one published win rate. Not one sample game for a buyer to preview. Not one independent review to cross-check.

The average chess student, the one losing games against the London System every Saturday night, does not need another advertisement. He needs a structure. And a structure has to be proven by something more concrete than a title with the word Benko in the wrong place.

Over the next six months the signal to watch is simple: the average user rating on the distribution platform, and whether the product publishes sample games. A good course will accept being examined. A weak one will keep selling by title.