Well, I thought you were going to take 24h/move, but I think you can decide on that.

2...Nc6

Anyway, just in case, I'm playing this move as Shredder has some ideas about playing tempo losing moves like Be2 or Be3 (or in some lines, both ) at low depth, with a happy face of 0.30 something, so I think it's worth a shot.

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 d6 6. Bg5 e6 7. Bb5 Bd7

I can't have certainty on anything, and this is not about knowing what the engine will play and have a single, infallible plan against it, it's about having working plans against the most likely moves that are coming from the engine.

As I said, I currently think that your engine is Stockfish, but can't say with which certainty, as it's also possible you're using an engine I didn't check or one that I don't even have, you can't expect me to check all possible engines (which is impossible). Also, I'm not leaving the engines analyzing the same position for hours like you do, I'm interacting with them at low depth, which means, that even if I nail the engine that you're using, I can't be certain of what move would it play at high depth. But that's not what the challenge is about, it's that, even if the engine plays a move that surprises me, one that I didn't check at all, I'll be on positions that I can still steer to my advantage (something unlikely if I was playing a Centaur because the centaur would surprise by having a long term plan I can't see, while the engine would only have a single line with positive score at a tail of the variation I can outprepare for).

What I'm trying to pull off is a Xanatos Gambit NOT a Batman Gambit, the latter to which you'd expect my explanations of the game to be like you said, in where I could be wrong and fail (having a simple line predicted and focusing on it would be like putting all my eggs on one basket).

I don't think predictions are useful this soon in the game, I think I can win in the end but eventually it's going to be a lot of work, right now my move was a simple one in where I'd expect to win the Bishop pair or get an attack on the Queenside against the castled King, while other white moves don't cause black problems. However, my plans will change as the game advances, and I can't predict what I'll do (say, by move 40), that would require trying to plan the whole game in advance which I don't think it's necessary.

I'm still going to predict that from this position I can make your engine show a negative score by move 20 or 24 (though you won't confirm that), and if not, engines at high depth play stronger than my estimations.

>I assume you meant with books on and therefore assume with books off this challenge becomes easier for you - is this correct?

I turned off my books at move 7, and just had my analysis from there, which I think will make Kappatoo happy as the position after your 7th move was one in where I didn't have any analysis at all, so that's the position where the game started. My only "book off" advantage was your engine's Bb5!? Be2!? plan (the latter which is best but can be played straight), so not much impact unless in future games your strategy would be to play full book until a drawn position or something. From the current position I think I have full equality.