Jerome Gambit: Risk Upon risk

If it is risky to play the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+), it is even more so to play it at the time control of one minute, no increment. And, to do so - blindfold?

If risky, also exciting, as the latest game from private eye Cliff Hardy shows us. He even shares one of his "secret weapons" in bullet play. Enjoy! [I have added diagrams, but the commentary is by Cliff. - Rick]

Hi Rick!

OK, I'm sorry to inflict this on you again but I like to try playing the Jerome Gambit under different conditions and against different opponents and have included a blindfold bullet Jerome Gambit game I played. Naturally, my opponent would not have played the game blindfolded (well, actually, I guess you never know, but there aren't many of us who are crazy enough to do it, so I rather doubt it 😉). 

Cliff Hardy - NN
1 0 bullet, Lichess, 2020

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+

4...Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5 6.Qh5+ Ng6 

7.Qd5+ Kf8 8.Qxc5+ d6 9.Qe3 Qf6 

10.0-0 N8e7?! =+

Stockfish gives best as 10...Nf4! 11.d3 g5, grabbing space, with a clear advantage for Black, but I admit that it doesn't seem quite so clear an advantage to me.

11.Nc3?! -++

And better here would have been 11.d3!, to stop the ...Nf4! move from being playable again.

11...c6? +=

11...Nf4!

12.d4 Kf7 13.f4 Rf8 14.f5 Nh4?! +-

14...Kg8! += would have left the knight on g6 immune from capture, due to mate on f1.

15.Qd3 

I missed that I could have trapped the knight here with 15.g3?, though Stockfish says that after that, Black could then have given back the piece advantageously with 15...Nhxf5! 16.exf5 Nxf5, upon which he then would have had a slight edge.

15...Kg8 16.g3? -+

Surprisingly a mistake, for reasons along the line of those given on the previous move. Better would have been to have grabbed space with 16.g4! +-.

16...Nhxf5! 17.exf5 Nxf5? =

17...Bxf5! -++ would have been a more forcing and better way to capture here, as it would have attacked the queen and forced White to have wasted a tempo to save it.

18.Ne4 Qg6?! =

18...Qxd4+! 19.Qxd4 Nxd4 20.Rxf8+ Kxf8 21.Nxd6 Nxc2 -++ was a bit too hard to see under the conditions of a bullet game.

19.Be3 d5 20.Nf2? 

20.Ng5 =+ would have been less defensive.

20...h5?! =+

20...Nxe3 21.Qxe3 Qxc2 -++ would have won a pawn.

21.Rae1 h4 22.Bf4 hxg3 23.Bxg3 

23...Nxg3?? 24.hxg3??

Oops? OK, taking the free queen with 24.Qxg6 would have been rather better. Hopefully if I'd been playing sighted I might have seen that! But hey, at least missing it made it more of an even game! 😉

24...Qxd3? = 

24...Bf5! 25.Qc3 Bxc2 -++ would have won another pawn.

25. cxd3?! =+ 

25.Nxd3 = would have kept a better pawn structure.

25...Bh3?? ++- 

Another oops!

26.Nxh3 Rxf1+ 27.Rxf1 Rf8 28.Rf2 Rxf2 29.Kxf2 Kf7 

30.Ke2 g6 31.Kd2 Kf6 32.Kc1 

I admit that my blindfold bullet games often deteriorate into this sort of thing. I'd forgotten where the pieces were and was just shuffling my king back and forth, aiming for the win on time! Sorry, but that's the advantage of having no shame!

32...Kf5 33.Kd1 Kg4 34.Kd2?? Kxh3 -++

Black's position was now totally winning as his g-pawn was unstoppable, though he now had less than 0.1 of a second left on his clock.

35.Ke1 Kxg3 36.Kd2 Kg2 37.Ke2 and White won on time, still with a good 22.1 seconds left on the clock 😉.

Bye,

Me 

Sarrat Attack: No Way A World Champion...

In my never-ending search to uncover not only Jerome Gambit and Jerome-ish games, but also possible precursors that might have inspired Alonzo Wheeler Jerome to create his gambit, I have run across a number of interesting, if old, openings. 

For example, in "No Way A GM Plays the Jerome Gambit! (Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3)" I looked at a couple modern examples of the Sarratt Attack (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 exd4 4.Bc4 Bc5 5.Ng5 Nh6 6.Nxf7 Nxf7 7.Bxf7+ Kxf7 8.Qh5+): Grischuk, A. - Karjakin, Sergey, St. Louis Blitz, St. Louis, 2018 (1/2-1/2 69) and Grischuk, A. - Dominguez Perez, L., St. Louis Blitz, St. Louis, 2018 (1-0, 43).

This was all very interesting, as I had noted in my post "The Sarratt Attack"

Of the Sarrat / Vitzthum Attack (see the recent "Another Distant Relative" as well as "A Bridge To... Somewhere" and "Abridged"), The City of London Chess Magazine wrote in 1875

This attack, invented by Count Vitzthum, was very much practised about twenty years ago. [Here, Readers may recall Meek - Morphy, Mobile, Alabama, 1855; Meek - Morphy, New Orleans, 1855; and Kennicott - Morphy, New York, 1857 as examples; although Lowenthal, in Morphy's Games (1860), had already opined "This {5.Ng5}is far from an effective mode of proceeding with the attack, and is decidedly inferior to castling" and "This mode of proceeding with the attack is comparatively obsolete, as with the correct play the defense is perfectly satisfactory." ] It is now abandoned in contests of strong players, as the analysis proved that Black can maintain his Pawn with a good position.

Recently, however, I ran across the following game:

Carlsen, Magnus - Vidit, Santosh Gujrathi
Tata Steel Rapid and Blitz, 2019

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.d4 exd4 5.Ng5  drawn

GM Vidit was rated 2722, but, when a World Champion offers you a draw...

From ChessBomb.com: "The commentators confirm that Magnus is feeling unwell today"  

Wrote SportsStar.thehindu.com "Troubled by an upset stomach" 

A GM Faces the BSJG: Not Quite (Part 4)

[continued from previous post]

Regarding the early Blackburne Shilling Jerome Gambit game that we have been looking at ("A GM Faces the BSJG: Not Quite, Parts 1, 2 and 3"), Nater, Carl - Rogers, Ian, Begonia op 09th, Ballarat, 1975 (0-1, 46 ), I was able to contact GM Rogers, who, in turn, was able to contact Mr. Nater.

Not surprisingly, GM Rogers said that he was shocked to see his 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3, Nc6 3.Bc4 Nd4 met by 4.Bxf7+!?. At first, he expected simply be able to refute the move, as he not had it played against him previously - and actually had not even seen it mentioned before. He settled himself down and outplayed his opponent, for the full point.

"I gave up 3...Nd4 soon after that game for multiple reasons, not least that it was a bad move!" was GM Rogers' assessment.

Mr. Nater, rather than claiming to be one of the world's foremost experts on playing the Blackburne Shilling Jerome Gambit over-the-board, modestly reported that "my openings at my prime [around ’75 probably] may have dived as deep as 4/5 moves before descending into chaos ... nowadays worse still." Not surprisingly, he did not have access to game score sheets from 45 years ago, so he could not say if he had repeated (or was repeating) his moment of chess opening inspiration.

"But there doesn't seem to be too much wrong with 4.Bxf7, more wrong with 3...Nd4" was his assessment.

My thanks to GM Rogers and Mr. Nater, for their comments - and for producing a very interesting game!

A GM Faces the BSJG: Not Quite (Part 3)

[continued from previous post]

We continue to examine how a future GM handles the Blackburne Shilling Jerome Gambit.

Nater, Carl - Rogers, Ian
Begonia op 09th, Ballarat, 1975

Black has two pieces for a Rook and three pawns.

9.Na3 d5 10.c3 Qe7 11.O-O 

Bringing the King to safety, although 11.d3 was a bit better.

11...Ne2+ 12.Kh1 Nh5 

White's Queen is stalemated. Nater launches a rescue mission.

13.d4 Be6 14.exd5 

Instead, Komodo 10 prefers some tactics: 14.Re1 Nxc1 15.exd5 Nf4 16.Raxc1 Qg5 17.Rxe6+ Nxe6 18.Re1 Qxd5, siding with White's three pawns versus Black's extra piece.

14...Bxd5 15.Qe5 Qxe5 16.dxe5 Bxa3 17.bxa3 Kf7 

18.Be3 Rh8 19.Rfe1 Bc4 20.Rab1 b6 21.Rb4 Bd3

22.c4 c5 23.Rb2 Nhf4 24.Bxf4 

This helps Black untangle his jumbled up pieces. The computer recommends, instead, 24.Rd2 Rd8, when it is tempting to suggest wholesale exchanges: 25.Rxd3 Rxd3 26.g3 Nd4 27.Bxf4 Rxa3 28.Be3 Rxa2 29.Bxd4 cxd4 30.Rd1 Rxf2 31.Rxd4 Rc2 32.Rd7+ Ke6 33.Rxa7 Rxc4 34.Rg7 and the game should be drawn.

24...Nxf4 25.g3 Ne6 26.Rc1 

He might have done better to protect his passed pawn with 26.f4. The game is beginning to slip away.

26...Nd4 27.Rc3 Be4+ 28.Kg1 Nf3+ 29.Rxf3+ 

A decision that will be understandable to many Jerome Gambit players: White goes with the extra pawns against the extra piece.

In club play, the pawns probably have a practical advantage; but a strong player can use the extra piece to show that he has many targets to attack, that the game is his. 

29...Bxf3 30.Rb3 Be2 31.Rc3 Rd8 

The pieces start to dominate, for example, 32.f4 Rd4 and one pawn will quickly fall.

32.e6+

A trick that Rogers does not fall for: 32...Kxe6 33.Re3+, winning the Bishop.

 32...Ke7 33.Rc2 Bf3 

All of a sudden, threatening checkmate.

34.Rc1 Rd1+ 35.Rxd1 Bxd1 

Again, at first glance, I (a middling club player) would be inclined to take White, here - but Komodo 10 tells the real story, rating Black as more than a Rook ahead.

Rogers' hungry Bishop now cleans up the hapless pawns.

36.f4 Be2 37.Kf2 Bxc4 38.Ke3 Bxe6 39.Kf3 b5 40.g4 c4 41.f5 gxf5 42.gxf5 Bxf5 43.Ke3 Bb1 44.Kd4 Bxa2 45.Kc3 a5 46.a4 b4+ White resigned

Hats off to Carl Nater, for his early play of the Blackburne Shilling Jerome Gambit. I hope to hear from him about the game, and his use of 4.Bxf7+.

Hats off, too, to Ian Rogers, future Grandmaster, for the chess lesson: he was surprised in his own trappy opening, but settled himself down and steadily outplayed his opponent.

[to be continued]