Zhuravlev Countergambit DESTROYED | The Merciless Qg4! ⚡ Quick Wins #87
#vienna #zhuravlevcountergambit #giraffe
chess noob Quick Wins! is a series of short videos, to demonstrate very quick wins! As a beginner, you become aware of the Scholar's Mate and the Fool's Mate, but neither of these show up in real games. However, there are tricky quick checkmates and wins that occur, even at the intermediate level of chess.
Today’s game is a delicious 7-move checkmate that is a cautionary tale highlighting how we hold assumptions about opening positions that can mislead us, and this is not only for beginner players!
I had the White pieces and of course, play the Vienna Game, to which my opponent responded with the Zhuravlev Countergambit (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Bb4). Although this response to the Vienna Game has historically been uncommon, it’s also quite old, much older than Soviet/Latvian IM Valerys Zhuravlev (1938-2021), of which the line is his namesake. Indeed, the earliest recorded game of the Zhuravlev Countergambit was (Hamppe — Falkbeer, 1855, Vienna). Those of you who know your Vienna Game history will know that Carl Hamppe is the OG – prior to Bardeleben labelling the (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3) the “Vienna Game” at the end of the 19th century, it was often known has Hamppe’s Game! Falkbeer was one of the Viennese chess players who developed and experimented with Hamppe’s Game and indeed, one of the main lines is known as the Falkbeer Variation (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6).
However, Falkbeer lost that game in 1855. The first recorded victory using the Zhuravlev was in a game with two chess legends of the romantic era in (Steinitz — Bird, 1862, London). Steinitz plays a completely solid opening, transposing it into the Three Knights Opening. However, he unsoundly sacrifices a knight to crack into Bird’s kingside and never recovers. The game is exciting with Bird trading his queen for Steinitz’s rook pair, to infiltrate into the Steinitz’s position via the h-file!
And so, we have (Klavins — Zhuravlev, 1969, Riga, Latvia) over a century later where Zhuravlev wins masterfully. What is curious in this game is that Klavins plays what I like playing against the Zhuravlev Countergambit, which is (3. Qg4)! – what I dub the Giraffe-ish Counter-Counterattack! If Black had played the very similar Anderssen Defense (2… Bc5), the (3. Qg4) is the Giraffe Attack. Tactically they are similar – the queen immediately pressures Black’s g7-pawn, asking the question why Black has developed their dark square bishop so early.
This move is not the most accurate according to the engine, but it’s still “fine”, with an evaluation change from [+0.5 → +0.2]. However, it’s the move with the high win ratio according to the Lichess community database and a surprisingly large number of players with the Black pieces, even those at higher ELO ratings, will blunder the next move!
The best response for Black is to not respond to White’s provocation and simply develop their king’s knight (3… Nf6). White can then win Black’s g-pawn (4. Qxg7), but their queen gets chased by Black and after (4… Rg8 5. Qh6), Black is ahead on development and White’s queen is awkwardly placed. White is technically better, but it isn’t an easy position to play.
However, in this game, Black played the second most common move (almost as common as the top response which is to exchange the bishop for the knight with 3… Bxc3) by developing their queen to defend the g7-pawn (3… Qf6??). This ostensibly reasonable looking move happens a quarter of the time in the position, and it is an outright blunder [+5]!
One of quick wins tactics in my book is the powerful move of placing the queen’s knight onto d5 (White) or d4 (Black). In this game (4. Nd5!) is a triple fork of Black’s queen, b4-bishop, but also the c7-pawn which comes with an absolute fork of Black’s king and a8-rook! Black decided to desperado their bishop, which was a mistake, as White effectively wins tempo by recapturing with development. Their best option in this parlous state is to trade queens.
One of the tricks in this position with White (and in the Giraffe Attack), is to recognise that Black’s d7-pawn is pinned to their light square bishop on the back rank. Simply, Black might not recognise that it is pinned. Usually, the queen’s bishop is always defended by another piece in the opening. It is beside the queen, and once the queen’s knight develops, it is also defended by the queen’s rook. As such, the queen’s bishop is almost never under threat in the opening, and we can make use of this natural assumption and bias!
By keeping the White queen on g4, Black’s eye will be drawn to the possibility of developing their d-pawn. This seems at first glance to be a very sensible move, as it forms a chain of pawns to control the centre on dark squares (having lost the dark square bishop). Developing the d-pawn also opens the diagonal and activates Black’s light square bishop, and even better, it reveals an attack on White’s queen!
However, this is what we are baiting, and in this game, it worked (6… d6??)! 😏
Black’s bishop was undefended, and thus they opened a devastating path for the queen to their back rank – (7. Qxc8#) – good game, GG!
