Leonhardt Gambit | DOUBLE BRILLIANT!!
#scandinavian #leonhardtgambit #brilliant #doublebrilliant #queentrap
Earlier in the week I had a seven-game losing streak on my Chessnut PRO. I hadn't used it for a little bit and had gone a little out of practice visualising the game over a 3D board.
So, I was very pleased when I finally won this game - and even better, two of my moves were rated as brilliancies by the chess.com analytic engine!
In this game, my opponent played the Qa5 main line of the Scandinavian Defense, and so I decided to try the queen trap line (https://www.chess.com/blog/vitualis/leonhardt-gambit-scandinavian-queen-trap) in the Leonhardt Gambit (1. ed d5 2. exd5 qxd5 3. Nc3 Qa5 4. b4 Qxb4 5. Nb5)!
This trap is potentially a high-risk manoeuvre at the intermediate level as Black will sometimes see through the plan. In this game, they didn't, so I managed to capture the queen with the initial brilliant bishop sacrifice with check, and then two subsequent forcing check moves with a discovered attack and capture of the black queen on a5 (7. Bxf7+ Kxf7 8. Qh5+ g6 9. Nd6+ exd6 10. Qxa5)!
This trap trades two minor pieces for the queen and being a bit behind of development. Stockfish still calls it a massive advantage [+4.6], but it's important to play carefully and consolidate.
Black needed to rapidly develop their pieces, but their attempt to chase my queen initially with a pawn, allowed me to reposition my queen, regaining some tempo with check, and then infiltrate in a slightly more advantageous position. By tactically pinning Black's knight against their king, it allowed Black's numerical piece advantage (5 pieces vs 4 pieces) not be felt.
On move 19, I'm proud to have found and played a rook sacrifice/trade for one of Black's knights. Their knight pair securing each other was quite strong and provided a robust defence for their king. Simplification was in my best interest, and I was pleased that the engine also rated this a brilliant move!
On move 26, Black blunders their bishop and after the capture, resigns, defeated. The interesting aspect of this game is that Black resigned with 15:38 on the clock, in a 15+10 game of rapid. This means that on average, they made each move in less than 10 seconds. I had around 10 minutes left. It's important to make use of your time in rapid and not undercalculate your moves!
Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/82092095361
