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In this game, my opponent responded in an interesting “Latvian Gambit”-type move, or a “reverse King’s Gambit” to my Vienna Game (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 f5). In my many games of the Vienna, this has only occurred twice before, once where I drew, and once where I lost.

Stockfish considers this aggressive move unsound at almost [+2]. In this game, I decided to play solidly with (3. Nf3), which according to chess.com, transposes to the Mlotkowski Variation of the Latvian Gambit. Black’s next move (3… Nc6) transposes the game once again, now to the Three Knights: Winawer Defense and after a bit of thinking, I found the best move – (4. d4) – immediately striking out in the centre [+2].

My opponent opted to immediately relieve the tension in the centre, but with the wrong pawn. A few trades later in the late opening, I have a major advantage in development and the evaluation is a straight up [+5]. On move 9 my opponent, possibly flustered, straight up hung their f-pawn with an advance (9… f4) and evaluation goes to [+6.5].

On move 10, my opponent finds the right move with (10… c6) as it allows them to capture a piece. However, during the game, I had a strong sense that this wouldn’t matter, if I kept up the pressure. In the position, Black had no pieces developed other than their queen. I was fully developed with all my pieces active. I decided that give up my knight, and instead, centralise my rook (11. Rae1) and interestingly, Stockfish called this a brilliancy!

I ended up not playing Stockfish’s preferred line, but it worked extremely well for me anyway! Black’s king was trapped in the centre of the board by sacrificing my knight, I now controlled the full open e-file with my rook! The correct move for Black was to side-step their king (12… Kd8), but these moves can be difficult to make as there is an aversion to losing the right to castle. Black’s blocking of the check with their bishop (a predictable blunder) completely justified the “brilliancy” with the evaluation now going to [+8].

We then go through a series of trades. I didn’t play the most accurately in this section, but it didn’t matter. We entered an endgame with the black king completely exposed, where they had a bishop and the rook pair, and I had a queen and rook. The queen is often just too strong in these situations, especially where the king is exposed. I first forced Black to trade their bishop for one of my pawns. Then, after Black cleanly lost one of the rooks via an absolute fork, they resigned. GG!

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/64734789553

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2022.12.14"]
[Round "-"]
[White "vitualis"]
[Black "luomin"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Timezone "UTC"]
[ECO "C25"]
[ECOUrl "https://www.chess.com/openings/Vienna-Game"]
[UTCDate "2022.12.14"]
[UTCTime "05:33:57"]
[WhiteElo "1341"]
[BlackElo "1176"]
[TimeControl "1800"]
[Termination "vitualis won by resignation"]
[StartTime "05:33:57"]
[EndDate "2022.12.14"]
[EndTime "06:03:56"]
[Link "https://www.chess.com/game/live/64734789553"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 {Vienna Game} 2... f5 $2 {[%c_effect
f5;square;f5;type;Mistake;persistent;true] Interesting \"Latvian Gambit\"-type
move, which Stockfish thinks is unsound [+1.95]} 3. Nf3 {This transposes into
the Mlotkowski Variation of the Latvian Gambit [+1.61]} 3... Nc6 {And transposes
into the Three Knights: Winawer Defense [+2.08]} 4. d4 $1 {[%c_effect
d4;square;d4;type;GreatFind;persistent;true]} 4... exd4 5. Nxd4 Nxd4 6. Qxd4
Qe7 $2 {[%c_effect e7;square;e7;type;Mistake;persistent;true] A mistake [+5.65] as
Black will potentially lose a rook to Nd5} 7. Bd3 $2 {[%c_effect
d3;square;d3;type;Mistake;persistent;true][%c_arrow
c3d5;keyPressed;none;from;c3;opacity;0.8;to;d5;persistent;false][%c_highlight
d5;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;d5;persistent;false] A relative mistake
[+2.82]} 7... d6 $2 {[%c_effect d6;square;d6;type;Mistake;persistent;true] A
mistake back [+5.09]} 8. Nd5 Qf7 9. O-O $6 {[%c_effect
g1;square;g1;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true][%c_arrow
d3c4;keyPressed;none;from;d3;opacity;0.8;to;c4;persistent;false][%c_highlight
c4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;c4;persistent;false] A relative inaccuracy
[+3.43]} 9... f4 $2 {[%c_effect f4;square;f4;type;Mistake;persistent;true] This
just hangs the pawn [+6.49]} 10. Bxf4 c6 11. Rae1 $3 {[%c_effect
e1;square;e1;type;Brilliant;persistent;true] A brilliant move that worked well,
even though I didn't play the Stockfish recommended line in the game} 11... cxd5
12. exd5+ $2 {[%c_effect d5;square;d5;type;Mistake;persistent;true] Stockfish
considered this a mistake as Black's king could side-step to d8 and they are
relatively okay [+2.71], something that I didn't consider in my calculation}
12... Be7 $4 {[%c_effect e7;square;e7;type;Blunder;persistent;true] However, they
played the natural human move to block with a piece, which is a blunder and very
winning for White [+8]} 13. Bxd6 Nf6 $6 {[%c_effect
f6;square;f6;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true] An inaccuracy [+12]. Black's best
move remains moving the king out of the pin to d8.} 14. Bxe7 Nxd5 15. Bf6+ Kf8
16. Qc5+ Kg8 17. Bxg7 $6 {[%c_effect
g7;square;g7;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true][%c_arrow
d3c4;keyPressed;none;from;d3;opacity;0.8;to;c4;persistent;false][%c_highlight
c4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;c4;persistent;false] An inaccuracy as Bc4
wins the queen, but White is still completely dominating [+6.6]} ({And example
line...} 17. Bc4 Be6 18. Rxe6 Qxe6 19. Bxd5 {[%c_arrow
d5e6;keyPressed;none;from;d5;opacity;0.8;to;e6;persistent;false,e6g8;keyPressed;none;from;e6;opacity;0.8;to;g8;persistent;false][%c_highlight
e6;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;e6;persistent;false]}) 17... Kxg7 18.
Bc4 $6 {[%c_effect c4;square;c4;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true][%c_arrow
c5d4;keyPressed;none;from;c5;opacity;0.8;to;d4;persistent;false][%c_highlight
d4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;d4;persistent;false]} 18... Be6 $6
{[%c_effect e6;square;e6;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true] This attempted defence
of the knight doesn't work [+6.3]} 19. Bxd5 Bxd5 20. Re7 Rac8 $6 {[%c_effect
c8;square;c8;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true]} 21. Rxf7+ Bxf7 22. Qd4+ Kh6 23.
Qf4+ Kg7 24. Qe5+ Kh6 $2 {[%c_effect h6;square;h6;type;Mistake;persistent;true]}
25. Qf6+ $2 {[%c_effect f6;square;f6;type;Mistake;persistent;true][%c_arrow
f2f4;keyPressed;none;from;f2;opacity;0.8;to;f4;persistent;false][%c_highlight
f4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;f4;persistent;false] Apparently there was
a [+M10] line with f4} 25... Bg6 26. c3 $6 {[%c_effect
c3;square;c3;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true]} 26... Rhe8 $6 {[%c_effect
e8;square;e8;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true]} 27. h4 Rc6 28. Qg5+ Kg7 29. h5
Rh8 $2 {[%c_effect h8;square;h8;type;Mistake;persistent;true]} 30. hxg6 hxg6 31.
Qe7+ Kg8 32. Qxb7 Rc5 $6 {[%c_effect
c5;square;c5;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true][%c_arrow
b7b8;keyPressed;none;from;b7;opacity;0.8;to;b8;persistent;false,b8a7;keyPressed;none;from;b8;opacity;0.8;to;a7;persistent;false,a7c5;keyPressed;none;from;a7;opacity;0.8;to;c5;persistent;false]
This loses the rook by force} 33. Qb8+ Kg7 34. Qxa7+ Kf6 35. Qxc5 {[%c_effect
g1;square;g1;type;Winner,f6;square;f6;type;ResignBlack] Black resigns. GG $1} 1-0