Fine checkmate
King's Gambit - post your favourite games as White!
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Wow
Apr 13, 2026
0
#90
This is a deeply inaccurate game. This way of playing against the Falkbeer isn't exactly brilliant. Black's 4th and 7th and 9th are bloomers, White's 6th is a bloomer (better and simpler was 6. Bxf7+), but it's an interesting instance of how the King's Gambit can lean into tactical themes from other openings (parts of the position after Black's 7th are reminiscent of the sort of structure one sees sometimes in the Vienna Game after 1. e4, e5; 2. Nc3, Nf6; 3. f4, d5; 4. fe, Nxe4; 5. d3, Qh4+?!; 6. g3; and also of the Latvian with 3. Bc4, fxe4; 4. Nxe5, Qg5?!; 5. d4, Qxg2; 6. Qh5+, g6; 7. Bxf7+), and how attacks can come naturally in KG positions.
Having said that, what led me to post the game was the mating net: it's unusual to see two Knights closing off a King's escape on two different files in the centre of the board, and it's unusual to have a completely occupied file (the c-file has no vacant squares in the final position). I thought it looked rather pretty, and the aesthetics swung it for me.
It's not a great game. Merely a little flight of flawed fancy.
Apr 16, 2026
0
#93
@Random_Carnage do you have any idea why players of the Black pieces seem to have taken to playing 4..., Qxd5 as per your game above #92? Back in the 1980s when I was first learning the KG it was "known" to be rubbish. 4...., Nf6 was the preferred move although blithe spirits like Bronstein sometimes tried 4..., Bd6. I've not really seen anything since to suggest that 4..., Qxd5 is really much good. I wouldn't dismiss it as dross these days, but I always feel happy when it's played against me.
Apr 16, 2026
0
#94
RalphHayward wrote:
@Random_Carnage do you have any idea why players of the Black pieces seem to have taken to playing 4..., Qxd5 as per your game above #92? Back in the 1980s when I was first learning the KG it was "known" to be rubbish. 4...., Nf6 was the preferred move although blithe spirits like Bronstein sometimes tried 4..., Bd6. I've not really seen anything since to suggest that 4..., Qxd5 is really much good. I wouldn't dismiss it as dross these days, but I always feel happy when it's played against me.
Yes it's fairly common, and yes, it ain't much good.
I've won most of my games when it's been played, and many I lost were when I blundered in the middlegame...
Apr 19, 2026
0
#96
RalphHayward wrote:
@Random_Carnage do you have any idea why players of the Black pieces seem to have taken to playing 4..., Qxd5 as per your game above #92? Back in the 1980s when I was first learning the KG it was "known" to be rubbish. 4...., Nf6 was the preferred move although blithe spirits like Bronstein sometimes tried 4..., Bd6. I've not really seen anything since to suggest that 4..., Qxd5 is really much good. I wouldn't dismiss it as dross these days, but I always feel happy when it's played against me.
Again Black chooses this highly dubious early exchange on d5, and as a result, is in a lost position by move 8, a move I overlooked (KS castled instead, to threaten all sorts of nasty stuff on the e-file) and played the fork next move.
Apr 23, 2026
0
#97
Another 4...Qxd5?!—yet another battering for Black.
You simply cannot afford to waste tempi this early against the KG.
Stockfish evaluates the position as White immediately regaining the advantage, at +0.48, despite still being a pawn down.
1604 rated dismantled.