Unraveling the secrets of the Blackburne-Shilling Gambit Trap.
Welcome back to yet another blog in the series Colab-A-Blog and today’s special
guest/assistant in today’s blog is @EaglesStrike go check out his blogs after this one. And before we continue this is the winner of the collaboration with @sushiracer and here's the link to join the winners club https://www.chess.com/club/team-usa , Get cozy and enjoy today’s history lesson about the Blackburne-Shilling Gambit Trap and lets get this blog to 200 vews.
The Blackburne-Shilling Gambit:
These are the moves required to play the gambit: 1.e4,e5 2.Nf3, nc6 3.Bc4, Nd4?!
The Blackburne-Shilling gambit starts with these moves, and the point of the maneuver is so that if white accepts the trick with *show this* 4. Nxe5? Qg5, forking the g3 pawn and the e5 knight. White thinks they have another free pawn after bxf7+, but after kd8, white is guaranteed to lose a piece and black has a central knight that is very powerful in the full trap. It is also super hard to play for white, as even though Stockfish says that black only has a minimal advantage, white has to constantly defend against checkmate threats, and they are the passive side.
Full Trap (Smothered Mate Variation):
1.e4, e5
2. Nf3 ,nc6
3. Bc4, nd4
4. Nxe5, qg5
5. Nxf7, qxg2
6. Rf1 ,qxe4+
7. Be2, nf3#
Example: https://www.chess.com/game/live/81642251189
In this variation, black checkmates white by using smothered mate, as the bishop can’t take the knight because the Queen could take the king after the bishop takes the knight.
Win A piece Variation:
1.e4, e5
2. Nf3 ,nc6
3. Bc4, nd4
4. Nxe5, qg5
5. Ng4?? D5!
In this variation, white knows not to take the f7 pawn with the knight because they watch gotham chess. They know that the g3 pawn is vital in this trap, so they defend the g3 pawn and move the knight at the same time. However, after d5, black is attacking the white bishop and adding another attacker to the g4 knight by opening up the c8 bishop. This is actually somehow still playable for white because during a tournament I, (Eagle), played this and won against someone who was 300 rating points higher than me so this proves that this strategy works even against higher-rated players.
How to refute the gambit:
Option 1: Decline
The easiest way to not fall into a gambit is to decline it. Stockfish actually suggests
4 moves: Nxd4, because after exd4, white can castle, and black has no developed pieces.
.
Option 2: Bishop check
If you are white and you really want that e5 pawn, you can take it without falling into the traps with bxf7+. This works better than nxf7 because that it is a forcing move, so white still has tempos. After kd8, stockfish suggests the brilliant O-O, sacrificing the knight, and after qxe5 c3, white now is the gambit player.
History and rise to fame:
The blackburne-shilling gambit became relatively popular, as 5% of people on lichess.org played nd4 after bc4, and it has a 49-47% win rate advantage for black! There has been many reasons for this boom of the gambit:
Italian Game Rise:
The Blackburne-shilling gambit is a gambit in the Italian Game, so the rise of the Italian will naturally rise the use of the gambit. The Italian Game was popularized by things like the fried liver and gotham chess, so much so that 42 percent of games go 3.bc4, 18% higher than the 2nd place ruy lopez!
YouTube:
2.1 Billion people go on YouTube every month and 5 hours of content is made every minute, so I think it’s fair to say it’s a popular site. Over 9.3 Million people have seen Bobby BoJangles’ video on it and over 2.1 million on chess talk’s video. This shows that the gambit has really taken the chess world by storm on its rise to fame and stardom.
Good Results:
As previously mentioned in the blog, the blackburne-shilling gambit has a high win rate as far as gambits go, and it has an astounding 75% win rate for black after Qg5 and 322,111 people have even pulled off the entire smothered mate trap! 98,540 for the win a piece one!
This is the end of todays blog big thanks to @EaglesStrike for helping out go check out his blogs and lets get this blog to 200 vews and join the usa club for them winning the compatiotin sya next blog bye.
