---

Yesterday evening, I had a really interesting and fun game against an opponent playing the King’s Gambit. The King’s Gambit is a very aggressive, but not entirely sound opening for white. I don’t usually play it as I’m a fan of the Vienna Game, but I’m always excited when an opponent uses it when I have the black pieces. What I often encounter are unusual positions, early aggressive attacks and counterattacks, and games that aren’t very long. This was the case for this game, which ended by checkmate on move 24.

One of the interesting things about the King’s Gambit in this game is that the speed of the attack was such that neither my opponent and I had time to follow usual opening principles – controlling the centre by developing pawns, developing pieces, and castling. As could be seen in the computer evaluation, white’s scary looking attack was very tricky, but wasn’t sound, as I had an opportunity to launch a devastating counterattack. However, at the beginner-intermediate level, the opponent will have to see that counterattack and it’s a gamble. For instance, although I considered that move, I didn’t calculate deeply and long enough, and assumed that it wouldn’t work.

So what happened in this game? I managed to fend off the opponent’s first opening salvo, and once the attack ran out of puff, we were both left with damaged king defense and almost no development. Into the middle game, I managed to develop my pieces slightly faster, accelerated with a couple of well time checks. This allowed me to return fire successfully for the win.

I hope you found this game interesting, and thanks for watching!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/40209636529

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2022.03.05"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Dmitrij0013"]
[Black "vitualis"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "C34"]
[WhiteElo "1302"]
[BlackElo "1320"]
[TimeControl "1800"]
[EndTime "1:25:32 PST"]
[Termination "vitualis won by checkmate"]

1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4 3. Nf3 Nc6 4. Bc4 Nge7 5. Ng5 d5 6. exd5 Nxd5 7. Nxf7 Kxf7 8. Qh5+ Ke7 9. Bxd5 g6 10. Qg5+ Ke8 11. Bxc6+ bxc6 12. Qxf4 Bd6 13. Qc4 Qe7+ 14. Kd1 Kd7 15. Re1 Qf6 16. Nc3 Re8 17. Rf1 Qe5 18. d4 Qh5+ 19. Ne2 a5 20. Rf7+ Re7 21. Rxe7+ Bxe7 22. Bf4 Ba6 23. Qf7 Qxe2+ 24. Kc1 Qe1# 0-1