Jerome Gambit: Not the Way to Attack (Part 1)

I just conceded a Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+) game to my number one tormentor in that line, auswebby at Chess.com.

He made short work of my favorite opening, the battle lasting just a bit over a couple dozen moves. I am now 0 - 3 against him.

I have some new ideas, as a result, but first it is worth looking at where the old ideas took me.

perrypawnpusher - auswebby

3d/move, Giuoco Piano Game, Chess.com, 2023

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ 

4...Kxf7 5.Nxe5+ Nxe5 6.Qh5+ g6 

This move usually leads to either Blackburne's defense (7.Qxe5 d6) or Whistler's defense (7.Qxe5 Qe7). In both cases Black offers a Rook that should not be taken without knowledge of the complications that follow; actually, against Whistler's Defense, it should not be taken at all.

A few years ago, I faced 6...Kf8 in perrypawnpusher - auswebby, Giuoco Piano Tournament, Chess.com, 2015 (0-1, 37). That loss against the Jerome Defense, (first suggested by Alonzo Wheeler Jerome in his analysis in an article in the Dubuque Chess Journal of July, 1874) was painful, as I had been 30 - 7 - 3 (79%) in the line. 

7.Qxe5 Qe7 

Whistler's defense it is. The line is named after Lt. G. N. Whistler, secretary of the Lexington, Kentucky Chess Club, who played it in a correspondence match against Alonzo Wheeler Jerome in 1876.

By the way, the alternative, 7...d6, Blackburne's defense, refers to the early game Amateur - Blackburne, London, 1884 (0-1, 14). 

8.Qd5+ 

More often played is 8.Qf4+, which I tried in perrypawnpusher - auswebby, Chess.com, 2022 (0-1, 46); in light of that loss, I figured it was time for a change.

Since I had played 8.Qd5+ successfully earlier in perrypawnpusher - moush54, chess.com, 2021 (1-0, 23), I thought I would give the move another try.

8...Kg7 9.b4 

Suggested by Yury V. Bukayev in his "JG: The New in Its Opening Theory, in Its Psychology (Part 15)" who points out that accepting the pawn 

leads to a very complicated fight where Black’s material advantage isn’t very large and where White gets an attack.

I believe that Yury is right about "a very complicated fight", although I suspect he will be disappointed to see my inability to make his words  - "where White gets an attack" - come true in this game.

9...Bxb4 

Stockfish 15.1 (40 ply) sees only 1/100th of a pawn difference between this capture and declining.

The Database has one 1-minute bullet game with Black declining: Anti-Duhring - Nadynoseer, 1 0 bullet, lichess.org, 2021, 9...Bb6 10.Bb2+ Nf6 11.e5 Re8 12.Qf3 Kf8 13.O-O d6 14.exf6 Qxf6 15.Bxf6 Bf5 16.g4 Re6 17.gxf5 Rxf6 18.Qxb7 Re8 19.Qd5 Re5 20.Qf3 Rexf5 21.Qg3 Rxf2 22.Rxf2 Bxf2+ 23.Qxf2 Rxf2 24.Kxf2 Ke7 25.Nc3 Ke6 26.Re1+ Kf5 27.Rg1 c6 28.b5 cxb5 29.Nxb5 d5 30.Nxa7 d4 31.Nc6 Ke4 32.Nxd4 Kd5 33.Rxg6 Kxd4 34.Rg7 h6 35.Rh7 h5 36.Rxh5 Kc4 37.Rg5 Kd4 38.Rg3 Ke4 39.Re3+ Kf4 40.h4 Kg4 41.a4 Kxh4 42.a5 Kg4 43.a6 Kf4 44.a7 Kf5 45.a8=Q Kf4 46.Qe4+ Kg5 47.Rg3+ Black resigned

10.Bb2+ Nf6 

White's Bishop is powerful along the a1-h8 diagonal. It will need additional support to make the attack successful.

[to be continued]

LCZero-Stockfish Superfinal Variation: Investigation Opened (Part 1)

We are past the mid-point of the "TCEC Top Chess Engine Championship" event, a 100-game Superfinal match between the computer chess programs Stockfish (Stockfish dev-20230409-b36d39) and Lc0 (LCZero 0.30-dag-a9b25c2b-BT2-).

Yury V. Bukayev pointed out to me that two of the games featured the opening 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.0-0 h6, and he suggested that the line be named "LCZero-Stockfish Superfinal variation".

I figured a little investigation might be in order.

It turned out that Stockfish played the unusual 4...h6 in one of the games, and Lc0 played it in the other. For both programs, the moves were described as being in their "book" of prepared moves.

How unusual was the line of play?

I consulted my ChessBase database (2016) and uncovered 320 games, the earliest from 1978.

Given that the Giuoco Piano is one of the oldest recorded openings - Damiano played it in the early 1500s and Greco played it in the early 1600s - that late date of 1978 seemed odd.

I checked Dr. Tim Harding's comprehensive UltraCorr 2023 correspondence database, and did not find an earlier game reference there, either.

In the meantime, I kept thinking about the related Semi-Italian Opening, 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 h6, examined in Chess Master vs. Chess Amateur (1963) by Max Euwe and Walter Meiden. It is much easier to find early examples, such as Bruijn, W. - Kloos, H., Amsterdam, 1851 (1/2 - 1/2, 39) and Kloos, H. - Blijdensteijn, WJ., Amsterday, 1851 (0-1, 39).

You can march the Semi-Italian Opening one step further with 4.0-0 and find an 1856 game (Willberg - Wolff, Balduin, Berlin, 1856 [1-0, 31] ) as well as 973 games in ChessBase database (2016).

Then, add 4...Bc5 to the Semi-Italian Opening and we are back to 1978 as the earliest game example of the "LCZero-Stockfish Superfinal variation".

From the time of Paul Morphy to that of Anatoly Karpov, the line seems to have disappeared?!

Clearly I need to do more research, and expand my sources.

 

Jerome Gambit Blog Post #4,000

* 4,000 *

Yes, that's right.

This is blog post number 4,000.

That is a long way from post number 1, "Welcome!", on June 10, 2008.

That is a whole lot of Jerome Gambit, Jerome-related, and occasionally not-so-related posts.

(And it has surpassed the 14 years that I published The Silent Knight, the chess newsletter for the United States Chess Federation of the Deaf.)

Many, many thanks are due to Readers, as well as those who have written to me and sent games and analysis.

I am already working on post #4,001.

The Common Approaches To The Chess Opening Nomenclature Part 2

 

The Common Approaches To The Chess Opening Nomenclature    

 

Part 2: IM Obodchuk’s Name ‘Anti-Russian Variation’ & Its Possible Substitutions     

  

(by Yury V. Bukayev) 

 

 

In Part 2 of my work (its Part 1 was published on Rick Kennedy’s blog, December 2, 2020) I’ll say about the name ‘the Anti-Russian variation of the Three Knights Game’ for 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 Bb4 – the very strange (in my opinion) name which was used by IM Andrey Obodchuk in his book ‘The Four Knights Game’ in Russian (this book was published in 2013 or in 2014 in Moscow). I have no opportunity to contact Mr. Obodchuk to ask him about this name and about russophobia, unfortunately, but it is possible to analyse the situation mainly without author’s explanation.  

 

Firstly, Mr. Obodchuk calls both 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3  and  1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3  as ‘the Three Knights Game’, but it isn’t right. Thus, only 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 is the Three Knights Game, in fact. The another system – 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 – is the Three Knights variation of the Russian Game, in fact. It should be noted that the common approach doesn’t permit to name these two variations identically. 

 

Secondly, this author calls 3…Bb4 as ‘the Anti-Russian variation’ (‘антирусский вариант’ – in Russian), but it can’t be right, since the Russian game (the Petrov defence) arises as a result of 2…Nf6 after 2.Nf3, so Black can’t form ‘anti-Petrov’ systems: only White can form them. It is according to another common approach to the opening system nomenclature. 

 

I suggest to re-name this variation and to forget the very strange name ‘the Anti-Russian variation of the Three Knights Game’ for it. Here are some of my variants for it: 

 

• the Russian Game: the Three Knights variation with 3…Bb4; 

 

• the Berlin variation reversed of the Spanish Game reversed; 

 

• the Russian Game: the Three Knights variation: the Berlin pseudogambit. 

 

The last variant can be understood after reading of the Part 1 of this my work where the term ‘pseudogambit’ was explained, after analysing of 3…Bb4 4.Nxe5. Or my other published work ‘The Winning Part of the Same Jerome Gambit – 4.c3 Nf6 5.0-0 Nxe4 6.b4 Nxf2 7.Bxf7+! (Part 2)’ (2023) can be used for it instead. 

 

 

 

Contact the author:  istinayubukayev@yandex.ru  

 

 

© 2023 Yury V. Bukayev (Copyright © Bukayev Yury Vyacheslavovich 2023). All rights reserved.  

[A legal using of this investigation with a reference to it is permitted  

and doesn’t require author’s consent.]