π₯ Chessnut Go | Vienna Game Main Line over Evening Coffee! βππβοΈ
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Yesterday, I met up with my mentee, who not long ago had finished his specialist family medicine training, and has also started some medical education work. After dinner in Marrickville, we played some chess and had some coffee at the fantastic pastry store Kürtösh. Check it out if you’re ever in Sydney!
I brought along my Chessnut Go portable electronic chess board to both record the game and to use with the app as an automatic clock! We played an extremely fun game of 5 | 5 blitz. I played the Vienna Gambit (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4), and my mate responded correctly with the Main Line (3… d5). However, the Main Line alone is not the refutation, and things unravelled a bit after that. One of the tricks/traps to know in the Vienna Game Main Line for White is that they must be prepared for Qh4+; and similarly for Black, to know when it is available and when it is not!
By the middlegame, I was comfortably winning, but this is a danger! It’s very easy to become careless and this struck on turn 23 when I played (23. Nf3??) straight up hanging the knight. In my mind’s eye, the square was defended by a rook on f1… except, it wasn’t a rook, but a bishop!
This was an exciting turn in the game though as my mate was now ahead with Black. We both had a rook and one minor piece remaining, but they had a pawn majority on both sides of the board. However, I had more activity. After being a little flustered, I pulled myself together and decided that the only way I was potentially winning was to use my activity to attempt relentless attacks on Black’s king. Potentially, I could equalise the material and head towards a draw or even win by flagging! Bishops and rooks synergise well together!
Black held their advantage well, and started to push their pawns forward, but unfortunately for them (38… f5??) was a blunder that equalised the position! Their plan was to sacrifice their pawn majority on the queenside to push their kingside pawns forward. However, in their haste, Black perhaps forgot that their knight on g6 was pinned after the g-pawn stepped forward (i.e., a loss of continuity), and this ultimately led to the loss of their passed f-pawn.
Suddenly, it was balanced and a drawing position, but I had a small time advantage. More than that, bishop and rook are probably easier to coordinate than knight and rook, and Black’s king was on the wrong side of the board. With (46. Rxg6+), I’d cleanly won their knight moving it to a completely winning endgame!
However, with only seconds left on the clock, I blundered the next move with (47. Bb5??). I realised this immediately as you’ll see in the video! π€£ Luckily for me, my mate didn’t see the blunder, and perhaps distracted by my antics, blundered back by deciding to trade rooks (47… Kxg6?? 48. Bxd7)! The move to find was (47… Rd2+!), moving the rook out of the bishop’s attack and winning tempo with check, which would then allow the clean capture of my rook!
With this mistake, I had a bishop in the endgame, and it was simply a matter of converting to the win. With the 5 seconds of increment per turn, this was relatively simple. It was still important to not stalemate, but I had the win on turn 73. Good game, GG!
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