Jerome Gambit: Cliff Hardy With A Bullet

 

Here is another Cliff Hardy Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+) chess battle - a bullet game against a grandmaster.

As always, the time control adds an additional factor to the game - Black must not only defeat the Jeorme Gambit, he must do so before his flag falls. As Cliff comments

It's just that today was very unusual in that I got to play a GM with the Jerome Gambit and won. Although I must admit, it's not that good - I got outplayed but was a bit quicker.

The notes are by Cliff. I have added diagrams.

Cliff Hardy (2458) - GM Andrey Sumets (2442), 

1 0 bullet, Lichess, 2022

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ 

4...Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5 6.Qh5+ Kf8

7.Qxe5 d6 8.Qg3 Nf6 9.Nc3 Qe7 10.d3 c6

11.Be3 Bxe3 12.Qxe3 g6?! -++

The Ukrainian GM wants to put his king on g7 and castle artificially but that could have been slightly better achieved by playing 12...Kf7 -++.

13.0-0 Kg7 14.f4 Re8 15.Qg3 b5

16.Rae1 b4 17.Nd1 Bb7? -+

The bishop was best left where it was to help cover the f5-square and defend against the white kingside attack. Best was to counterattack in the centre with the risky looking 17...d5! -++.

18.f5?! -++

The attack could slightly have been improved by playing first 18.Ne3 (threatening to win the queen with 19.Nf5+!) e.g. 18...Kh8 19.f5 -+.

18....Qe5 19.Qh3? -++

19.Qh4 -++ would have better covered both the weakened dark squares of g5 and h6.

19....d5 20.Nf2 dxe4 21.dxe4 Rad8 22.g4 g5 23.Qe3 h6 

24.Kg2?

I missed the capture of the a-pawn with the queen again! 24.Qxa7 -++ would have been best here.

24...c5 25.h4 Qd4 26.Rh1?

Much better would have been 26. hxg5 Nxe4! (26...hxg5? Qxg5+ =) 27. gxh6+ Kh7 28. Nxe4 Qxe3 29. Rxe3 Rxe4 -++.

26...Nxe4 27.Qxd4+ Rxd4 28.Kg1 Kf7 

29.hxg5 Nxg5 30.Rxe8 Nf3+? -++

30...Bxh1! -++ would have been best.

31.Kf1 and Black lost on time but still had a winning position

At least my kingside attack slowed the GM up a bit...