The History of the Grob Opening

Many of the top chess players in the world have agonized for years over the same question: what is the best opening in chess? There are hundreds of different moves to consider, and hundreds of ways to answer the question. Even with the world's top experts pondering this question, it will probably never be answered. However, if you want to know the worst move in chess, look no further than the grob.

The grob, or Grob’s Attack, is a chess opening in which the white player immediately moves the king’s knight pawn forward two squares. It was created by and named after international master Henri Grob. It is widely considered one of, if not the, worst possible opening in chess. Opening with the grob is also the only way to checkmated in two moves, as shown by this video of popular chess streamer Alex Botez playing the very confident Jschlatt:

Now as I’ve shown in some of my previous articles (like in this one), I don’t like to criticize a chess move without first trying it out a couple of times. So without further ado, I played a few games with the grob.

In the games that I played, I followed up the grob opening up by pulling the bishop into the gap created by the pawn. This allows me to take control of the longest diagonal on the board, and put pressure on the rook. The main downfall of this strategy is that you surrender control of the center of the board.

Despite my attempts to make the best out of the poor situation the grob left me in, I did not win any of the three games I played. Everytime, black seized the opportunity to take immediate control of the middle. After black took the middle, I was pretty much on my heels the whole game. 

In conclusion, the grob sucks. That was never up for debate. If you want to win a game of chess, maybe don’t play the grob. The grob is a horrible opening with an interesting history, the opposite of most chess moves.