[Chess] Beat a titled player for the first time

1. e4 e5
2. Nf3 Nc6
3. d4 exd4
4. Bc4!?


The Scotch Gambit!!

I faced this opening as Black maybe once before, and I remember I tried to hold on to the pawn with like …Bc5 or something. I don’t really remember how that game ended, but I had a different plan this time around.

I knew you can transpose to a line in the Italian game with 4…Nf6 5 e5 d5, so I decided to take that route, even though I am just as clueless there as well.


4… Nf6
5. e5 d5


The position I wanted to reach. At least here, I won’t have to worry about some vicious attack.


6. Bb5 Ne4
7. Nxd4


So here, my “book line” basically ended. What’s very cool though is that after the game, when I checked how the mainline goes in this line, it turns out that I played the mainline up to move 11, which was pretty cool.


7… Bd7


Breaking the pin, and threatening the e pawn which forces him to take action.


8. Bxc6 bxc6


8…Bxc6 9 Nxc6 bxc6 would just be stupid since I am left with pretty much nothing to show for my crippled pawn structure. (I don’t think half open b-file is all that great here). By keeping the bishop, at least I have the bishop pair as a form of compensation.


9. 0-0 Bc5


Developing the bishop to the most aggressive square


10. f3 Ng5
11. f4


Although this move turned out to be the mainline in this opening, during the game (when I didn’t know this was the mainline) it felt awfully strange. He just moved the pawn twice to accomplish…what? My knight will go back to e4, and now, e4 is really weak for him. Though he can always seek a knight trade.

It turns out, however, by playing f3 and f4 one move at a time, it gains a tempo for White compared to playing f2-f4 in one move, which is pretty counter intuitive at first. If White played f2-f4, then it would be Black’s turn. But since the play continued f2-f3, Ng5, f3-f4, Ne4, it’s the exact same position, but with White to move! Ah. Tricksy…


11 … Ne4
12. Be3


Developing the knight first is not advisable since Nc3 would ruin his pawn structure when I take, and Nd2 leaves his Knight on d4 hanging.


12 … Bb6


So this is where I began to deviate from the mainline, which would be 0-0 in this position. I was sad that Nd2 is coming and I would inevitable have to depart with my beautifully placed knight… In order to stop that, if that’s possible at all, I was thinking maybe I could play c6-c5 and d5-d4 and create some complications that way.


13. Nd2 c5
14. N4f3 Bg4


I didn’t play d5-d4 right away, because I was afraid that after something like 15 Nxe4 dxe3 16 Qxd8+ Kxd8 17 c4, not only can I not castle, but the pawn on e3 will most likely fall sooner or later, leaving me a pawn down. Pinning a knight seemed like a pretty useful thing in general, so I decided to go with that.


15. h3 Nxd2


I can’t retreat the bishop, since it will be lost after g4 and f5, Noah’s Ark Trap style. So the choices were either Bxf3 or some other in-between move. I didn’t want to capture with bishop, because I thought that if I’m going to lose my bishop, might as well make him double his pawns, which looking at it now, isn’t even that big of a deal for White, but whatever.


16. Qxd2


I was prepared to part way with my valuable light squared bishop, but he spared it for the time being.


16… d4


I had the chance to save it by retreating, but I decided that this was more adventurous. After 17 hxg4 dxe3, I thought the passed pawn could give me some dangerous plays, though it could very easily just fall too. He can’t take the pawn right away with Qxe3 since c5-c4 would win the Queen for the bishop. Either way, White decided none of that is happening.


17. Bf2


To borrow Bobby Fischer’s words, “He won’t get a second chance to snap off the Bishop”. Now that I’ve been given the opportunity to save my light squared bishop, I realized how valuable this bishop can be. After all, this is my trump card, something I have and he doesn’t.
My precious…


17… Bf5
18. g4


Woah! Pretty aggressive pawn storm there. Although this makes sense as it gains time by attacking the bishop, deep inside, I felt like this had to be somewhat unsoundish pawn storm. With no light squared bishop, his light square along the long diagonal, leading straight to his King, will be really weak.


18… Be4
19. Ng5


Well this guy certainly knew how to keep momentum going. He attacked the bishop yet again, while placing his knight on the 5th rank, which always should touch your nerve when it happens to you.

But here is precisely where I began to really notice the weak color complex. I was like “wait a minute… in this position, his light squares along the long diagonal are totally weak…” AND THEN, I noticed a very basic checkmating idea of lining up my Queen and Bishop along the long diagonal.
So that meant that the bishop has to retreat to either b7 or c6. I’m not sure if it would have matter which, but I chose to put it on c6 on a superficial reason of “bishop can help the kingside better if need be” Silly I know.


19… Bc6
20. e6!?


A move that made me go “oh shit, I still haven’t castled have I?”
A really annoying move this was. My king is still in the center, and my opponent is doing the right thing in trying to break open some lines and come after my king. I thought for a really long time here, weighing in different options. Obviously, I don’t want the flood gate to open, and I would like to put my Queen on d5 ASAP and get threats of my own going.

So what do I do here…. I considered fxe6, f6, Qd5, and 0-0, and in the end, I decided that my checkmating attack is going to be more powerful than any attack he has right now, and I was willing to sac some material in order to get my own attack going.


20… 0-0


A castled king is a happy king


21. exf7+ Rxf7!?


A really committal move, considering that I didn’t calculate accurately, but worth it I thought. I’m sac’ing a whole rook so that I can line up the Queen+Bishop battery without losing time. I thought I should be getting some compensation during the attack in some form, if not mate.


22. Nxf7 Qd5


Threatening mate of course.


23. Nh6+??


I didn’t know how losing this move was until the post mortem.
During the game, I thought the reasoning behind this move was to double my pawns and make my king wide open. Since the knight is going to be lost anyway, it might as well mess up my pawn structure as it goes.

All pretty logical, except he needed that knight on f7, so that when I bring my Rook on a8 into the game to the e file, he has the resource of blocking the file with his knight. The threat of that alone would have had made me spend a tempo to capture the knight with my king which would have given him an extra tempo to set up the defenses.

But as it turns out, he must have completely missed my resource of Re8, and hence why he made this move.


23… gxh6
24. Bh4


Making room for his King to run.
Here, I was really excited, because I knew it was more or less over. I mean I only calculated up to Re8+, but even from there, it wasn’t too hard to see that I’m going to win massive amount of material.
Turns out… it’s a forced mate.


24… Qh1+
25. Kf2 Qg2+


Abusing that light square weakness. Oh yea!


26. Ke1 Re8+


0-1

Boom! A move that he must have missed, as he resigned in about 10 seconds from when I made the move.

The mate would be 27 Kd1 Qxf1+ 28 Be1 Bf3+ 29 Kc1 Rxe1+ and whatever he does with the Queen, I take the Queen and mate.
Despite the fact that it is my King who is WIDE OPEN, and nobody around, it is HIS KING who is more in trouble.

Well there you have it. My first win against a titled player. I didn’t know he was one at the time (and maybe that helped?), but still, a win is a win

Link to the game: http://www.chess.com/livechess/game?id=967755304

Hopefully I’ll have more of these in the future haha.