Against 1.Nc3 in Tournament Play

Hi- tomorrow night I have a tournament and there's one person I know always plays 1.Nc3, in blitz or long play. I'm wondering what some people play against it just in case I get paired against him.

I hear people consider in inferior that the other main moves like e4, d4, c4, or Nf3, but why? Say two top 50 GMs were playing and white played Nc3. How could black play for an advantage?

Thanks for your time
FAJTV

It is considered inferior mainly because it blocks in the c pawn too early, but also because it commits the knight to c3, when it could be better on d2 (the other knight seldom comes to e2).

@FunnyAnimatorJimTV Nc3? is quite inferior, not because black is better, it is because white gives all his initial advantage and now black will try gain an opening advantage, Nc3 but d5! is a great move, fighting for the center, study some lines with 2. e4 or d5 but black is very good there, when playing d4 opening mostly white wants to play e4 gaining a center (black needs to avoid e4) but more important white wants to play c3 or c4 gaining space advantage so Nc3 is mostly breaking all d4 concepts

As black you have a few good options.

The most popular is 1...d5, which forces white either into a Veresov with d4, or to play something like 2. e4 d4 Ne2 e5 Ng3. Black is at least equal.

If you want to go into more familiar territory 1...Nf6 is good. Usually white plays 2. e4, which you respond with e5 and are in a Vienna game.

c5 is also good, where white will either transpose into a closed/Grand Prix Sicilian or play 2. Nf3 with 3. d4, an easy to play position. But the Closed Sicilian requires some theory knowledge.

I'd recommend 1...Nf6

I'd recommend 1...d5 because transposing into an opening(like water flame said) that doesn't give Black he advantage is not a good idea against 1.Nc3?!
1...d5 is good also because anyway in those types of pawn structures the knight is not good on c3, and is actually bad.

Don't try to transpose into an opening commonly played as White because that means that White is fine or good.

@thekid456 Say I play d5 and then white plays e4, trying to wheel this knight somewhere better

What do you recommend here?

Maybe e6 or c6 trying to keep the knight on c3?

@FunnyAnimatorJimTV when e4 is played you need to play fastly d4, it can be like the nimzowitch opening where the knight is expelled from c6, the concept is that when e4 is played if you play c6 with d4 you just transposed to caro-kann and with e6 he plays d4 and it is french, the idea is to not play passive, take the inittiative with black, dont try defending the pawn, on e4 openings the knight on c3 is quite good on d4 openings it is quite bad

@FunnyAnimatorJimTV If you play 1...d5 you can just treat it as a reverse Nimzowitsch defense, which you play. Though, it is not as hard as white as the early h4/h5 attack doesn't work against 1. Nc3.

@WildTricks #8 I assume my opponent is going to be very familiar with this variation, and in the time I've played this variation with white in the past, and with 1...Nc6 with black which is my main, the Nc_'s player's play comes very fluidly. With an extra move advantage, it should be even better.

He is about 2100 USCF. I have played against him with white pieces and drew against him, but that was a long play game. He has most likely been playing Nc3 for 10+ years. It may be tough for me.

@Water_Flame #9 Exactly; white has an extra move advantage which makes it tougher. Maybe I should just play the d7-d5-d4 line, and then play the moves that I wouldn't like to see (reverse) if I were playing black in Nc6, like rushing my queenside pawns as quickly as possible