Vienna Game | I got CRUSHED by my 700 ELO subscriber!
#vienna #mainline #brilliant #blunder
This game is a tale of woe. My subscriber, who wanted to remain anonymous played the Vienna Game: Main Line against me (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4 d5) and I had assumed in this first game against them after the opening that I was going to easily win. They were rated in the 700s in daily games.
Immediately clarified the centre, and we were left on move 5 with an e-pawn each, but on the "wrong side" of the board. White had a semi-open f-file having lost their f-pawn in the exchange. I had a semi-open d-file, with my queen controlling that file. This geometric difference means that I had better control of the centre, and the position is almost [-1] in favour of Black.
And this turned out to be the case. I created a battery of my bishop and queen staring at White's f2 square. White tries to defend with Qe2, the only move that wasn't disastrous. However, I found (8... Bg4) a brilliant move! This attacks the black queen and is seemingly hanging. If they take the bait and capture the bishop, then Qf2 is super winning.
This was where I blundered. I was playing this out on my phone. White played (9. c3), counterattacking my queen. In my impatience, I had thought that Black had found a refutation to my attack, and so withdrew the queen to d7. White's c3 was actually a blunder [-6] as I had a beautiful sequence where I force trade the queens, trade minor pieces, and I end up clean up a rook. Winning.
However, my retreat was a blunder [+2], with White now winning with a better position, and capture my e4 pawn for free! Retrospectively, it was arrogance that stopped me from looking at the position more closely.
On move 13, I deliberately hung my knight as a trap, hoping that White would capture with their pawn, opening the d-file. As this was a daily game, I had time to chase through a series of potential checks in the calculation, and foresaw a beautiful mating sequence, around a [-M9]! White, however, avoided the trap and played well. I blundered a complicated position with the evaluation going to [+9]. Luckily, Black didn't punish me with finding the right line, and I breathed a sigh of relief when they offered a queen trade. With Black trading away their most active piece, the evaluation dropped back to [+0.6] - I had a chance again! This part of the middle game was very complicated, but I came out ahead, entering a rook and bishop endgame at [-6]. We had the same-coloured bishops and I was up two pawns. Winning!
I managed to trade off the bishops on move 40, entering a rook and pawn endgame. Here, arrogance struck again as I didn't calculate clearly before shooting off moves. I few moves later, I blunder a rook move, going from winning to [0.00]. One move later, I miscalculated, assumed I had enough time, a sacrificed my rook, which was a game ending blunder. On move 51, I throw in the towel. GG!
