The Nimzo-Indian is both a solid and ambitious reply to 1. d4. White is often quickly forced by Black to run risks - such as doubled pawns or an isolated queen pawn. At the peak of world chess, there is a clear preference for the Classical System 4.Qc2 - in which White sacrifices speed of development to retain the bishop pair and prevent Black from compromising White's pawn structure. 

In the Classical Nimzo-Indian - 4. Qc2, Knut Neven has produced an easily comprehensible database with 24 texts and 478 selected and mainly annotated games. After an introduction and a history of the system, there follows an excellent description of the typical motifs which crop up in the Classical System, i.e. the advantage of the bishop pair, the placement of the minor pieces, recurring tactical motifs, key pawn structures and pressure against c4. Then there comes the opening theory of the Classical System in 18 chapters. There is also a large reference database of nearly 23,000 games, of which approximately 1000 are annotated. The CD is rounded off with a training database and an extensive opening tree, generated from the games. All the data on the CD can be accessed with a reader based on ChessBase 9.0.