Rubinstein Variation, Capablanca Line

The Capablanca Line is White's 7. Ne5 in the Blackburne branch of the Rubinstein French. It places the knight on a central outpost at once instead of preparing development with 7. c3, the Kasparov Attack. Black's most frequent reply is 7...Be7. The other main tries are the immediate 7...c5 against d4 and 7...Bd6, which the engine favors alongside 7...Nd7 to challenge the knight. The engine rates the position as roughly balanced, though White scores well in the relatively few Lichess games.