Englund Gambit Declined | Double Brilliant WIN!!
#queenspawnopening #englundgambit #brilliant #doublebrilliant
This game is an example of how things can go very wrong for the Queen's Pawn Opening player with the white pieces when they try to avoid the trickiness of the Englund Gambit! My opponent declined the Englund Gambit (1. d4 e5 2. d5) which is instantly good for Black [-0.1], as White is forced to move their d-pawn twice in the opening losing tempo and be placed in a somewhat overextended position.
On move 4, White attempted to regain tempo by attempting to pin my knight (4. Bg5), but this allowed me to respond with my first brilliant move extremely early in the game (4... Bxf2+)! By ostensibly sacrificing my bishop, I win a pawn, White loses the right to castle and even more tempo as their king is attacked. And the fascinating thing is that this is White's best option!
In this game, White saw and didn't like this and refused to capture my bishop with (5. Ke2). However, this was a mistake that gave me a second brilliancy with (5... d6)! Now admittedly, "sacrificing" the bishop a second time isn't difficult to see, but I'll accept the brilliant designation by the chess.com analytic engine!
In the next few moves, I develop my queen into the attack, something that is very dangerous for White with their king potentially exposed and in the centre of the board. White scrambles to try to develop and create an attack. However, in their haste (11. Nc4), they blunder the limited defence of their centre, hanging their e-pawn.
By the early middlegame, I had a major advantage at better than [-5]. This was in the form that I controlled the centre with my pawns. White, on the other hand, was missing their f, e, and d-pawns, with their king a target. And that was my principal tactic - to simply attack White's king with my pieces in the centre, which ended up being overwhelming. After move 25, White runs out of time trying to play through a hopeless position [-11] and flags. GG!
The big takeaway from this game is that the Englund Gambit remains a great weapon at the beginner-intermediate level against the Queen’s Pawn Opening!
Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/91947495923
