It is very common for a chessplayer to look at White's first few moves in the Jerome Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+) and ask himself, "What is White thinking??" Sometimes the first player has a head full of fever dreams like the following games, which I turned up while looking through The Database for 8-move contests containing the "essence" of the Jerome Gambit, or at least an insight into how it "works".
decent - fulldecent
lightning, FICS, 2003
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.d4 exd4 6.Ng5+ Kf8 7.Qf3+ Ke8 8.Qf7#
soulman - tobinskov
standard, FICS, 2007
1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 Nc6 3.Nf3 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.d4 exd4 6.Ng5+ Ke8 7.Qf3 h6 8.Qf7#
drumme - jherman
blitz, FICS, 2011
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.d4 exd4 6.Ng5+ Ke8 7.Qf3 h6 8.Qf7#
Odizzel - narciso
blitz, FICS, 2005
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7 5.d3 d6 6.Ng5+ Kf8 7.Qh5 Nf6 8.Qf7#
braken - klonka59
2011
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kf8 5.Bd5 Nf6 6.Ng5 Nxe4 7.Nxe4 Ne7 8.Qf3+ Black resigned
Yes, indeed, things frequently go differently, if Black defends properly; but these games reinforce the lesson Tartakower liked to pronounce about some opening ideas, that is "dubious, therefore playable". Black relaxed and told himself that he would get around to defending, any time now – to his misfortune.
With one game left to complete in the ChessWorld Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament, and that one largely unbalanced, the final standings can be predicted as follows
AsceticKingK9 27/28
mckenna215 23.5/28
braken 19.5/28
Rikiki00 19.5/28
Knight32 18.5/28
shm19cs 16.5/28
blackburne 15/28
Magni 14/28
Haroldlee123 12/28
DREWBEAR 63 11/28
pixifrufru 9/28
Baron wd von
Blanc, heart pirate 8.5/28
Luke Warm 8/28
klonka59 5/28
martind1991 3/28
The old caution still holds today: if you strike the King, you must kill him. If the King survives your blow, he is likely to come back with all his force and deliver a brutal revenge.
The following position is from blackburne - klonka59, Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament, ChessWorld, 2011. To be fair, Black was doing quite well until recently, but, as you can see, he has allowed White back into the game – and a very messy one, at that.
White has two Rooks to Black's Queen, and three extra pawns to match Black's Knight.
33.Rxd1 Qxd1 34.Rg6+ Kd7 35.Rxh6 Qxc2+
Now White has a Rook and a Bishop and a couple of pawns to face the Queen. Things might still be about even, but White's pawns allow him to keep the pressure on.
36.Kf3 a6 37.f5 Qxa2 38.e5 Qd5+ 39.Kf4 Qxd3
Black's Queen has been doing her best to deal with the White pawns, but two of them are beginning to look scary.
40.Rh7+ Kc6 41.Bd4 Qf1+ 42.Kg5 Qg2+ 43.Kf6 Qg8 44.Rg7 Qd8+ 45.Kg6 a5
Black has his own passed pawn to advance.
46.e6 Qe8+ 47.Kg5 Qd8+ 48.e7 Qe8 49.f6 Kd5 50.Kf5 a4
51.Rh7 Qd7+ 52.Kg6 Qe8+ 53.Kg7 Ke6 54.Rh8 Qf7+ 55.Kh6 Kd7
Black has done what he can to restrain the "Jerome pawns" but it is not enough.
56.Rd8+ Ke6 57.e8Q+ Qxe8 58.Rxe8+ Kf7 59.Re7+ Kf8 60.Kg6 a3 61.Rxc7 a2 62.Rc8 checkmate
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| Haroldlee123 - klonka |
Here we have my favorite checkmate from the lingering Chess World Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament.
White has just played 69.e7 checkmate.
He might just as well have played 69.Bh6#.
Promoting three pawns to Queens and sacrificing one would have been a bit too much: 69.d7 Ke7 70.f8/Q+ Kxe6 71.d8/Q Ke5 72.Qf5#
With five games left in the ChessWorld Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament, the leaders have been decided, but battles still rage up and down the finish line.
AsceticKingK9 has taken first place with 27 points out of 28 games, mckenna215 has taken second with 23.5 points out of 28 games, and braken has taken third with 19.5 points out of 28 games.
However, with a recent win Rikiki00 has lept to a tie with Knight32 for fourth place with 18.5 points, and with one game still in play he could, with another win, move into a tie for third.
Down the ladder, Luke Warm is holding onto eleventh place with 8 points, but, with a final win, pixifrufru could leap over him to 9 points out of 28 games. Both could be bypassed by Baron wd von Blanc, heart pirate, who has 7.5 points with two games to complete.
Even martind1991, holding down last place with 2 points out of 23 games, can vault over his nearest rival, klonka59, if he finishes strongly.
The standings of the current ChessWorld Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament
AsceticKingK9 25/26
mckenna215 23.5/28
braken 19.5/28
Knight32 18.5/28
Rikiki00 17.5/26
shm19cs 15.5/27
blackburne 15/28
Magni 12/26
Haroldlee123 11/27
DREWBEAR 63 11/28
pixifrufru 8/27
Baron wd von Blanc, heart pirate 7.5/26
Luke Warm 6/26
klonka59 4/24
martind1991 1/15
White surprises Black.
Black surprises White.
Sometimes it is not only "who surprises who" that counts, but who recovers from the surprise first, as the following game from the soon-to-be-finished ChessWorld Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament shows.
braken - klonka59
ChessWorld
Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament, 2011
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kf8
The Jerome Gambit Declined, a rare bird.
White surprises Black with the gift of what is, objectively, a won game. Black, in turn, surprises White by preferring to be a pawn down, with an ill-at-ease King.
5.Bd5 Nf6 6.Ng5
This attacking move opens the diagonal for White's Queen while preparing a fork of Black's heavy pieces. Nonetheless it has its downside.
6...Nxe4
Perhaps Black has become disoriented, overlooking, for starters, that the White Bishop that should have disappeared at f7 is now protecting the pawn he just grabbed.
Or, perhaps he was aware that the Bishop was still on the job, and expected, after 7.Bxe4, to play 7...Qxg5.
In either case, he missed the more effective 6...Nxd5 7.exd5 Qxg5.
7.Nxe4
Saving the White Knight, and putting the heat on the Black King.
7...Ne7 8. Qf3+ Black resigned
Black will lose his Knight and Queen, for starters.
The ChessWorld Jerome Gambit Thematic Tournament is underway, all 15 competitors and all 210 games!
We are already seeing results (8 completed games so far, 6 wins by White) from AsceticKingK9, mckenna215, Rikiki00, braken, blackburne, DREWBEAR 63, Knight32, Magni, pixifrufru, shm19cs, klonka59, Baron wd von Blanc heart pirate, martind1991, Luke Warm and Haroldlee123.
Many games are in their early stages, others are racing along.
There are a number of examples of the Jerome Gambit Declined (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kf8/Ke7) – a relatively rare beast making up only about 9/10th-of-a-percent of the games in The Database – those certainly will expand our understanding of that line.
At least 29% of the games are "classical" Jerome Gambits, with 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.Bxf7+ Kxf7+ followed by 5.Nxe5+, which is the highest percentage that I have seen in a recent Jerome Gambit thematic tournament. Some "well established" theory is likely to be stood on its head by the time those games are done!
With about 7 out of 10 games following "modern" (non-5.Nxe5+ lines) there will be plenty of practice to round out the theory of this more tempered approach as well.
Next Sunday I will give further information on the progress of the tournament. When all games have developed far enough for me not to influence their play, I will begin presenting some with annotations.
(By the way, I predict that the tournament winner will score 24 out of 28 points.)
