How to beat the King's Gambit

Have you ever hated having to play black against the King's Gambit?  Especially against lower rated players with the fear that they can wipe you out in less than 20 moves?  In this game I show you a safe and reliable way to beat the King's Gambit.

VoteChessTroll wrote: ... In this game I show you a safe and reliable way to beat the King's Gambit. 1. e4 e5 2. f4 Qh4+! 3. g3 exf4! {So what has happened? Well, first of all the g-pawn is pinned and being attacked, so white is a pawn down for nothing. Even worse, both the white king and the rook on h1 are vulnerable. One possible line is} 4. Nc3 fxg3 {with a decisive threat of g2 discovered check, because} 5.hxg3? {is answered with} 5... Qxh1 {winning a rook for free. In fact white could easily resign in this position.} 0-1

Perhaps worthwhile to look for some improvement along the way?

That's a plain trolling:

Best sound defense to KG is the simple, quiet 2. .. d6, as Spassky wrote (I believe-- either he or Fischer? or both). I'm old enough to remember, but old enough to forget which one recommended d6. Actually works out rather well, deflating much of White's game prep at no cost.

I thought the Fischer line was 1 e4 e5 2 f4 exf4 3 Nf3 d6.

Correct. I looked it up on Wikipedia and been done lernt a lesson.

"2...d6, when after 3.Nf3, best is 3...exf4 transposing to the Fischer Defense (though 2...d6 invites White to play 3.d4 instead)"

So, 2. .. d6 may be out of sequence. I lerned it from my older brother when I was a small fry, and he told me with a confident air that it was from Spassky, but the Russian actually stole it from Bobby Fischer. So I carried that bit o' lore with me and have always ever after replied to KG with 2. .. d6, with not too bad results.

Petar Trifunović famously defeated Tal with the Falkbeer: http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1076559

Might I suggest the modern variation: 1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3. Nf3 d5 4. exd5 5. Nf6. Chances for both sides, and there is a larger emphasis on development.

I usually play the Cunningham Gambit against the Knight's Gambit.  (1. e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3. Nf3 Be7) without the Bh4+ nonsense, which really doesn't end well for Black.

Magnus

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1584993

That is indeed a problem.

A solution may lie in the Vienna Opening:

1. e4

2. Nc3

3. f4

By playing Nc3 first and only then f4, you cut off many of the branches that Black has in a traditional KG.

But then you're stuck playing a Vienna Gambit.

Nothing wrong with that, is there?

You could even cut out the middle-man and play 1. Nc3

That's a bit too radical for me. It gives Black too many options that will be new for me, like d5 or c5.

I'm not saying 1. Nc3 is not playable, far from it, but I've been playing 1. e4 all my life and at least there I know what to expect on Black's first move.

I'm basically an 1. e4 or 1. Nf3 player... but I won the Atlantic Provinces Championship playing 1. Nc3

One of the games started like this:

The posiiton after move 3 leads to the Scandi variation of the Alekhine after the exchange of knights on d5. 

Taking on c3 is bad for Black. 4. ... Nb6 is more standard.

But now, in a thread that started about beating the King's Gambit, we have veered wildly off topic...

Yes, it sucks.

An old friend of mine, Harry Lyman, played a match against Weaver Adams ages ago where Lyman had black every game and he totally demolished the Vienna.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?yearcomp=exactly&year=&playercomp=either&pid=&player=Weaver+Adams&pid2=&player2=Harry+Lyman&movescomp=exactly&moves=&opening=&eco=&result=