Jerome Gambit: Is This Enough to Refute?

 

I have always encouraged those who visit this blog, and those who play the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+), to become as familiar as possible with many "refutations" of the opening.

It is helpful to know what your opponents might play against you.

Where might they get their ideas? In truth, probably the best place would be this blog. In all fairness, I think I have posted every "refutation" extant, and will post new ones as they are produced.

Like I said, it is helpful to know what your opponents might play against you.

There are many places your opponents might research, but some of them are not very convincing.

For example, a visit to the WikiBooks coverage, Chess Opening Theory/1. e4/1...e5/2. Nf3/2...Nc6/3. Bc4/3...Bc5/4. Bxf7 provides pretty thin gruel:

4. Bxf7+?

White's plan is to lure black's King into the open. This gambit is relatively weak because black can deflect any attack while maintaining a significant material advantage. The obvious response is Kxf7.

Theory table

For explanation of theory tables, see theory table and for notation, see algebraic notation..

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

	4	5
Jerome Gambit	Kxf7	Nxe5+ Nxe5	=+

Yes, that's it.

If that coverage scares you off, I hear that Win with the London System, by Sverre Johnsen and Vlatko Kovacevic is pretty good.