I tried the Max Lange Defense Vienna Gambit!

#ViennaGame #ViennaGambit 

Recently, I discovered another chess content creator on YouTube and chess.com, Boot Camp Chess. I’d watched their video on a variation of the Vienna Gambit from the Max Lange Defense line of the Vienna Game. The Max Lange Defense is a fairly solid response to the Vienna and in fact, if both players make the best moves, you might end up transposing into either the three- or four-knights defense or an Italian Game. I personally find this a bit depressing as I don’t particularly like playing those lines, which tend to be more positional.

So, I was quite excited to see that the Vienna Gambit, a straight up f4 on move 3, was playable in the Max Lange Defense.

As you will see in this game, however, I make a mistake in the opening fairly quickly. Playing f4 weakens the dark squared diagonal to the king, something that my opponent cleverly exploited well. The thing to learn against this line of attack from black is to be willing to move the king and give up the right to castle, something that might be a bit counterintuitive.

This game otherwise went down a fairly weird path, with my king entering the centre of the board. Having lost all three king-side (f-, g-, and h-pawns), the king was better protected and placed, behind my pawns controlling the centre. The critical error made by my opponent was castling short. With that part of the board being wide-open, it gave me the opportunity to launch a strong counterattack. While Stockfish rated my penultimate move of the game, 19. Raf1, a “blunder” (from -2 to -6 in evaluation), this was only if my opponent with the black pieces found the only good move, which wasn’t at all obvious. Other than that, the next best moves was completely winning for me at +5 to +6! They didn’t find it, blundered their queen, and resigned immediately afterwards!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/46315739635