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Recently, one of my subscribers (@yosoyfood) contacted me on chess.com saying that they enjoyed my content, and we played a 30-min rapid game of the Vienna Game Main Line. This was a wild and exciting game as I carelessly blundered a piece in the opening, and afterwards, we were both scrambling to gain or regain an advantage! I’ll discuss this game later.

Game 1: https://www.chess.com/game/live/53976549565
A few days afterwards, yosoyfood sent me a game they had just played where they used a bishop to f7 sacrifice in the Vienna Gambit, that was one of the tactics seen in “Double Brilliant Line in the Vienna Gambit” video. When I reviewed this game, I was blown away! It contained a consecutive double brilliant sacrifice – a beautiful and devastating manoeuvre!

The chess.com “Game Review” shows how remarkable this game was. My subscriber played at 93.1% accuracy, and apart from one mistake and book moves, all moves were either best moves, great moves, or brilliancies! You can see where they levelled up and went Super Saiyan: move 8 – brilliant, move 9 – brilliant, move 10 – great move, move 11 – great move!

The first brilliant move (8. Bxf4) sacrifices the knight on f3, but in doing so, gains a tempo and opens the king-side access to both bishops and the queen, and takes advantage of White’s massive advantage in development. The second brilliant move (9. Bxf7+) removes the f-pawn what is practically the last line of defence for the Black king (the e- and g-pawns had long wandered away) and pulls the king out forward. The opponent resigned on move 13, which is a bit of a shame. They had only one forced move, Ke6, and my subscriber would have finished this amazing game with a fitting pawn checkmate with d5!

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2022.08.11"]
[Round "-"]
[White "yosoyfood"]
[Black "TheByzantineEmperor"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Timezone "UTC"]
[ECO "C28"]
[ECOUrl "https://www.chess.com/openings/Vienna-Game-Falkbeer-Vienna-Gambit"]
[UTCDate "2022.08.11"]
[UTCTime "17:02:59"]
[WhiteElo "1028"]
[BlackElo "1058"]
[TimeControl "600"]
[Termination "yosoyfood won by resignation"]
[StartTime "17:02:59"]
[EndDate "2022.08.11"]
[EndTime "17:06:25"]
[Link "https://www.chess.com/game/live/53976549565"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4 exf4 $6 {Vienna Gambit Accepted} 4. e5 Ng8 5. Nf3 Nc6 6. d4 g5 {A mistake [+3.12]. This significantly weakens the king-side defence, especially the light square diagonal.} 7. Bc4 {Stockfish prefers d5, but the pressure on f7 pays off} 7... g4 $2 {A mistake [+3.48]} 8. Bxf4 $3 {A brilliant move $1 Sacrificing the knight on f3 results in open access to Black's king-side to the bishops and queen.} 8... gxf3 $2 {Black takes the bait which is a mistake [+6.67]. The best move was d5 to block the light-squared bishop.} 9. Bxf7+ {Another brilliant move $1 This sacrifice now fully opens the light square diagonal.} 9... Kxf7 10. Qxf3 $1 Ke8 $2 {A mistake [+M6]. Nf6 was the best move.} 11. Qh5+ $1 Ke7 12. Bg5+ Nf6 13. Bxf6+ {[%c_effect
e1;square;e1;type;Winner,e7;square;e7;type;ResignBlack]} 1-0

Game 2: https://www.chess.com/game/live/53575770997
Now luckily for me, the game I played with my subscriber a few days earlier didn’t involve the humiliation of being crushed in this fashion. They had the White pieces and opened with the Vienna Game (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3). I obliged with the Falkbeer (2… Nf6), my subscriber played the Vienna Gambit (3. f4), and I played the only good response to the Vienna Gambit (3… d5) and we entered the Vienna Game Main Line.

My subscriber didn’t respond with the optimal next few moves, and I realised that they were likely unfamiliar with the Main Line. This is common at the beginner-intermediate level as the Main Line is quite uncommonly reached from the Vienna Gambit. I decided to play aggressively, and on reflection, too carelessly, and blundered on move 6 with an immediate aggressive attack on my opponent’s misplaced queen on f3 (6… Bg4).

Down a pawn, my goal was to try to finish development, consolidate, and find an attack. I thought I had this with a knight and queen combination against the White king on move 15. Stockfish evaluation agreed – that I was winning at around [-6]. However, my subscriber found a very clever counterattack, and after a trade of queens, we entered the late middle game still down a pawn with my subscriber winning at [+3]. At this point, we each had both rooks, and a dark square bishop.

At this point, I suspect that my subscriber and I had slightly different strategic approaches. They used their moves to push pawns. On the other hand, I aimed to develop my rooks and infiltrate them to the second rank. Keeping the rooks on light squares made them immune to my subscriber’s bishop, and when both rooks were on my opponent’s second rank, this represented an impenetrable forcefield to the opponent’s king, which was still on its home rank. A couple of mistakes later, my subscriber lost their bishop without compensation, and we entered an endgame where I had rook and bishop, against my opponent’s rook. There was some shuffling, and my subscriber resigned on move 46 as their rook was passively stuck guarding their remaining pawn and only hope, their king was cut-off from the other pieces, and I could now leisurely advance my four passed pawns.

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2022.08.07"]
[Round "-"]
[White "yosoyfood"]
[Black "vitualis"]
[Result "0-1"]
[Timezone "UTC"]
[ECO "C29"]
[ECOUrl "https://www.chess.com/openings/Vienna-Game-Main-Line"]
[UTCDate "2022.08.07"]
[UTCTime "01:45:59"]
[WhiteElo "1029"]
[BlackElo "1283"]
[TimeControl "1800"]
[Termination "vitualis won by resignation"]
[StartTime "01:45:59"]
[EndDate "2022.08.07"]
[EndTime "02:18:08"]
[Link "https://www.chess.com/game/live/53575770997"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4 d5 {Vienna Game Main Line} 4. Nf3 dxe4 5. fxe5 {Not the most optimum move [-1.08]} 5... exf3 6. Qxf3 $2 {A mistake [-4.19]} 6... Bg4 $4 {A blunder $1 [+2.90] The knight on f6 and pawn on b7 are both hanging.} 7. Qxb7 Nbd7 8. exf6 Nxf6 9. Be2 $6 {An inaccuracy. Immediately attacking with Be2 is best.} 9... Bxe2 10. Nxe2 Bd6 11. Qc6+ Nd7 12. O-O O-O 13. b3 Ne5 14. Qc3 Ng4 15. Ng3 $4 {A blunder [-6.71]. Black is setting up an attack on the White king, and Be5 skewers the White queen and rook.} 15... Qh4 {This is a mistake [0.00] as White can force a trade of queens with Qxg7+} 16. h3 $4 {A blunder [-5.86]. White didn't find Qxg7+, which is hard to find.} (16. Qxg7+ Kxg7 17. Nf5+
{[%c_arrow
f5h4;keyPressed;none;from;f5;opacity;0.8;to;h4;persistent;false,f5g7;keyPressed;none;from;f5;opacity;0.8;to;g7;persistent;false][%c_highlight
g7;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;g7;persistent;false,h4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;h4;persistent;false]
A royal fork. After the queen is captured, White and Black are equal in evaluation.}) 16... Bxg3 $1 17. Bb2 Bf2+ (17... Bh2+ {This is the best line [-6.25]} 18. Kh1 Be5 {[%c_highlight
e5;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;e5;persistent;false]}) 18. Kh1 f6 $4 {A blunder [+1.89]. This results in the loss of the knight on g4.} 19. Qc4+ $1 Kh8 20. Qxg4 Rae8 21. Qxh4 Bxh4 22. Ba3 Rg8 23. c4 Re2 24. d4 Rge8 25. d5 Rc2 26. Bb4 Ree2 27. Bc5 $4 {A blunder [-1.32]} 27... Rxg2 28. Bg1 Bg3 29. Rf3 Bh2 30. Bf2 $4 {A blunder [-6.78]. The bishop is lost in this move resulting in a winning endgame of rook and bishop (Black) versus rook (White).} 30... Rgxf2 31. Rxf2 Rxf2 32. Re1 Be5 33. c5 h6 {Creates an escape square of the king, neutralising any future risk of back rank mate} 34. d6 cxd6 35. c6 Rc2 36. a4 Rxc6 {With this move, the d-pawn is a passed pawn} 37. Re4 Rc3 38. Rb4 Rxh3+ 39. Kg2 Rg3+ 40. Kf1 Rd3 41. Ke2 Rd4 42. Rb8+ Kh7 43. Ra8 Rb4 44. Rxa7 Rxb3 45. a5 Ra3 {It is now impossible for the a-pawn to promote [-39.7]} 46. Kd2 d5 {[%c_effect
h7;square;h7;type;Winner,d2;square;d2;type;ResignWhite]} 0-1