
Spassky and Hippopotamus defense
The hippopotamus defense is the system where Black plays g6,Bg7 and b6,Bb7 and typically d7-d6,e7-e6 with knights on d7 and e7.
Boris Spassky used it in his World Chess Championship in 1966 against Petrosian.
The game ended in a draw.
Hikaru Nakamura @Hikaru used it today against @wonderfultime Minh Le
https://www.chess.com/article/view/arena-kings-season-8
Here's the position in the opening Hikaru has the black pieces, Minh Le White.
now a couple of moves later, here's the position BlBlack to play
Black castled. But Stockfish is suggesting h6-h5!? with an attack for Black without castling !!
According to the engine, the best play would lead to this position
Black would eventually castle 0-0-0
There's nothing wrong with Hikaru's move and later on he was able to clinch a win in this Arena Kings 8 game.
Can you find the winning move for Black ?, Black to play
Now I want to be fair to Minh Le who faced Hikaru in the Knock-Out phase. Hikaru repeated the hippopotamus defense (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hippopotamus_Defence)
In this game, White managed to win and Hikaru got knocked out. GM Bortnyk won the finals later.
Lets see how Wonderfultime managed to beat @hikaru the #1 seed