A game I played today as black in the "double Smith-Morra gambit"

This gambit (the cousin of the Danish?) seems very aggressive. White probably wants his 2 tempi and open lines to lead into a gigantic attack ASAP. I'm not sure anything short of brutal attack works, so Qe2 would be out of place, which means 6. Ne2 is OK. It also doesn't block the f-pawn.

8. f4!? trying to nuke the centre with a massive development lead would have been my choice. Black in that position down 3 tempi (dxc3, cxb2 and a6) and undeveloped looks precarious.

To my eyes, 8...e5?! is a bad choice wasting yet another tempo while weakening f7 and d5. 9...g6?! makes things worse by weakening the kingside dark squares while doing nothing for development.

To exploit these moves, the primitive 10. Qf3!? Qe7 (10...f6 looks playable but aesthetically poor) 11. Nf4!? looks like an interesting choice, as does the immediate 10. Nf4!?. In both cases white aims at d5 and the kingside weakened dark squares while abusing both his bishops' lines. I think white would hold a much larger advantage there than with the tame 10. Ng3.

12...Nge7 looks good and safe against most of the sacs I looked at. Maybe I missed something, but it just feels like white should have a win somewhere...

13...Qh4?! I think is slightly inaccurate. 13...Qh4 14. fxe5 Nxe5 15. Bxe5! Bxe5 16. Bxf7+ Kd8 17. Nc3 (or 17. Rc1!? threatening Qa5+ mating) and the attack continues. (note: 17. Nc3 is to develop, not so much to block the bishop since e.g. 17. Rc1 Bxa1?? 18. Qa5+ b6 19. Qxb6#, so the rook is temporarily safe.) 13...0-0 is safer, returning one pawn to keep your monarch healthy.

17. d6! would have kept your queenside locked up while freeing white's bishop, where white still has plenty of play for his two pawns. 17. d6 b5 18. Bd5 Rb8 is still good for white as you must waste many tempi trading bishops and getting your rook out into the game.

20...Bb7 seems too relaxed. Moving pieces away from your kingside isn't great when there's an attack mounting there, and connecting rooks does nothing if they have no targets to attack/cannot defend the king. 20...Bd7, 20...Qh6 (intending ...Qe3) or something to slow the attack may be better.

White's final desperate attack could've been improved at various points:

• 23. f6!? (controlling kingside dark squares and playing for mate, where 23...Bxf4?! gives up a crucial defender)
• 25. Nxf4!? (more material is always nice)
• 27. Qg3+!? Kf7?! 28. Bxh5+ Kf6 and white has at least perpetual (probably more) via 29. Qh4+ Ke5 30. Qf4+ Kf6 31. Qg4+ Kg7 32. Qg3+ etc). If 27. Qg3+ Kh8 28. Rh4 Rf7 29. Rxh5+ Rh7 30. Qg6 Rxh5 31. Bxh5 and white seems to have a sort of perpetual at least... really hard to tell. (This is my human analysis, for better results use an engine to look at this here.)

After 27...Qf6 in the game, black is won, a rook up and king finally safe. Whew.

It looks like a really really really interesting game here. White played aggressively but didn't seem to quite find the right tactical breakthroughs, while black understandably overlooked (I think; all the above analysis could be wrong! :P) many of white's blows and underestimated the strength of possible attacks.

General advice: Develop develop, especially against aggressive gambits. After 9 moves you only have a piece out while white has 4 and a safe king; recipe for disaster. King safety is important when facing gambits; don't be afraid to return a pawn for a better game. (That said, your thoughts at moves 26 and 27 should be "AAAAH MY KING" rather than "Darn, I lost a pawn.")

Thank you so much Remellion, you've given me a lot to consider and think about. I do think you're right in a lot of your lines,  and here I thought I was being clever defensively I see now it was white who missed some attacking opportunities.

I actually broke down and ran a computer analysis and it agrees that the early e5 push by me was an inaccuracy and g6 was a mistake. After 9... g6 the computer says white should take f7 with his bishop right away. When after 10...Kxf7 11. Bxe5 black can find himself in some trouble. Although computer analysis shows only a 1 point advantage for white after this, the gambit would have paid off.

It's impressive how you were able to key into that move 10 as being an opportunity for white. In fact, computer analysis showed it was white's only opportunity in the game to take advantage of his lead in development and open lines after the two-pawn gambit. After the knight jumped back to g3, white lost this opportunity, and was at a disadvantage the rest of the game...except for at one point where on move 16 I went Nd4, 17. fxe5 would have won a pawn (and here yet again your insight about the e5 push being bad is shown to be correct)

Computer showed that 24. Nh5 offering his knight up for sacrifice was a blunder by white, and that I actually made a mistake in not taking the knight right away. When after bishop captures the rook on f4 first, the knight can recapture on f4 and get itself out of danger.

Something I find a bit ironic is that this is that same knight that was on h5 earlier, back at move ten. There white timidly retreated the knight when he shouldn't have. And here on move 24 white boldly puts that same knight back on h5, when now it's just a blunder.The computer analysis showed that after taking the knight I was never in any danger of being checkmated and white was at a -5.85 disadvantage, and this disadvantage grew with every move until, after 30. Rg3, white had a -8 disadvantage even before the pawn fork.

I guess this shows that it takes a real skill to play something like the Smith-Morra gambit, a player must have a knack and intuition to identify the right moment to convert their advantage, if they miss this moment, they'll probably lose the game. The most time either of us spent on this game was me, when I took about 10 minutes deciding whether or not I should take the knight. But white should have taken more time thinking earlier, as he was in no less of a serious situation since to win the game he must convert that early advantage. I think perhaps many white players view the Smith-Morra as easy, they think they'll just play it and automatically blow black away, but it requires a lot of effort and thought in order to find those opportunities for attack, which often arise in the gambit, but are often missed by a careless white player.

Aside from that, there are a few questions I want to ask.

Do you really think my move of a6 was a waste of a tempi? This is a recommended opening move to make in many of the counter-Smith-Morra gambit systems, restricting white's light square bishop and taking away tactics.

Also, though control of the e5 square is critical in the Smith-Morra gambit, with white wanting to push his pawn to e5 and black wanting to avoid this, my idea of preventing the e5 push by going e5 myself and blockading the pawn was shown to be unsound. If you were in this position what would you have done on move 8 instead?

6...a6 is a very prophylactic move. It prevents Bb5 trading for a knight/pinning the d-pawn in some lines, and also a future Nb5. However, with white's bishop on b2, I think here the idea with 6...Nc6 7. Bb5 Qb6 (and if 8. Bxc6 Qxb2) is better for black, so just the straightforward 6...Nc6 developing, and ...a6 at a later point if ever white has threats there.

Why is control of the e5 square important? When white pushes e5, he denies your knight f6, gives a foothold for attack with a future f4-f5, and controls d6 while possibly rendering your d-pawn backward. It is also very hard to undermine thanks to white's Bb2 and black's lack of space. Also note that the typical freeing idea 8...d5? just opens the centre for white's attack, and if white got a free move 9. e5 d5? 10. exd6 e.p. Qxd6 11. Qxd6 Bxd6 12. Bxg7 is lethal. So, I'd recommend 8...d6 here, which allows 9. e5 d5 now, gives some space, and keeps options for a future ...d5 or ...e5 much later.

10. Bxf7! wow. As expected of fearless silicon, but should also be a candidate move for strong players. I missed this shot and the powerful follow-up 11. Bxe5!. White needs to start the action at this point with a huge lead in development and piece activity against black's weakened squares.

In fact, why should 8...e5 and 9...g6 ring alarm bells? In the Sicilian, d5 usually turns out to be a key square, and your pawn on e6 was to blunt the c4-bishop. After pushing ...e5, both d5 and f7 look really weak. As for 9...g6, it weakens the kingside dark squares and the long diagonal (against white's Bb2!) without doing anything for development while white's pieces are all aggressive, a very scary situation. 9...d6 supporting the e5-pawn or 9...Nf6 controlling d5 in event of Bxf7+ and Qd5+ are better options here.

I see that about a6 now. I've mostly studied the normal Smith-Morra where they only gambit one pawn, and in that, a6 on move two or three is standard in many of the systems.

This two-pawn Danish version of the Smith Morra is harder to find information on. I actually have the Chessbase DVD on the Smith-Morra gambit by IM Lawrence Trent who is a specialist in it, and in the DVD he doesn't cover this variation at all. I believe the two-pawn gambit may be worse for white, because while computer analysis shows no disadvantage for white after gambiting one pawn, it does show a disadvantage after gambiting two.

Now that you've explained it I completely see how e5 was a bad move now. First I moved the pawn twice in the opening when I was already way behind in development. Secondly it weakened the f7 and d5 squares. From my studies I remembered "white wants to push e5, control the e5 square" and I think I was focused too much on that and also misinterpreted it. I think what they mean black should do is control the e5 square with the minor pieces, not occupy the square with a pawn as I did.

Part of my motivation to play e5 was also to kick the knight away. In the normal one-pawn Smith-Morra gambit that knight doesn't advance like that and instead goes to f3, not e2 where the queen goes. So it was a little different for me seeing that.