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Those following my channel will know that I’ve been trying to learn the Max Lange Vienna Gambit recently – a tricky and winning line against the Max Lange Defense of the Vienna Game (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4). Although it’s technically a bit suboptimal for White, in practice according to the Lichess community database of lower-rated games of blitz and rapid, it’s very successful.

One of the advantages of the Vienna Gambit (Max Lange) is that it’ll typically take the game away from Italian-esque, or Bishop’s Opening Berlin-Vienna Hybrid closed lines. Black at the intermediate level will usually have intuitions on how to play those lines from experience from closed Italian games.

This was a daily tournament match – U1400 Australia vs England where I was playing for Team Australia. I had the White pieces, and, in this game, Black responded with (3… Bb4), which is like a delayed Zhuravlev Countergambit (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5X_LrdT7hCWOknaIkqRiPS0VhlmoBmOi). When I saw this, I wondered how much some of my understanding of the Zhuravlev Countergambit would transfer over…

I decided to go for it with (4. Qg4), what I call a “Giraffe-ish” attack, with the queen immediately pressuring the g-pawn on g7, made possible by Black’s early development of their bishop. This is quite an immediate threatening attack and I’m trying to bait Black to defend their g-pawn with Qf6. In the Zhuravlev Countergambit, this is a reasonable move. However, when analysed in this line, it doesn’t work and is a mistake [-1.3]. Simply, with Black having developed their queen’s knight, that additional control of the centre will result in White’s queen being chased around if they play accurately. The correct move for White was (4. Nd5), moving the knight to its advantageous square and winning tempo by forcing Black to move the bishop.

Luckily for me, Black took my bait and played (4… Qf6), a blunder [+4]! This is a blunder as I now have the powerful tactic of the queen’s knight advancing to the d5 square, which attacks Black’s queen on f6 as well as the pawn on c7, which comes with an absolute fork of the king and rook! Simply, Black cannot defend both the g-pawn and the c-pawn with a single queen move.

So out of the opening, I manage to win a massive advantage. The queens leave the board (meaning that Black doesn’t have an immediate powerful counterattack), Black’s king loses the right to castle, and I win Black’s rook, potentially trading it for my knight (though Black cannot immediately capture it).

The remainder of the game isn’t simple as no simple quick wins are available. However, I manage to maintain my material advantage in the middlegame. Black’s pawn structure was damaged in the opening with doubled pawns on the f- and g-files on the kingside with a hole on the c-file on the queenside. With me having a pawn majority on the queenside the strategy was to slowly advance the queenside pawns, and force piece trades if possible. This creeping advance worked and on move 30, Black made a serious mistake with (30. Ka8) as they pinned their bishop on the a-file. This allowed the next move (31. b6), putting pressure on the pinned piece and Black resigned immediately given that the bishop was going to be cleanly lost the next turn. GG!

The big takeaway from this game in learning the best continuity down this line in the Vienna Gambit (Max Lange). The best move is to challenge the misplaced bishop with (4. Nd5) or (4. a3). There is a tactical but risky spiciness with (4. Qg4) as well, which can backfire.

Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/daily/571558377

[Event "U1400 Australia vs England  - Board 54"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2023.10.10"]
[Round "-"]
[White "vitualis"]
[Black "Icarus58"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Match "https://www.chess.com/club/matches/1537411"]
[Timezone "UTC"]
[ECO "C25"]
[ECOUrl "https://www.chess.com/openings/Vienna-Game-Max-Lange-Vienna-Gambit"]
[UTCDate "2023.10.10"]
[UTCTime "10:03:04"]
[WhiteElo "1190"]
[BlackElo "1315"]
[TimeControl "1/259200"]
[Termination "vitualis won by resignation"]
[StartTime "10:03:04"]
[EndDate "2023.10.13"]
[EndTime "08:11:17"]
[Link "https://www.chess.com/game/daily/571558377"]
[WhiteUrl "https://images.chesscomfiles.com/uploads/v1/user/3711094.f52a0759.50x50o.ab18600a8723.png"]
[WhiteCountry "17"]
[WhiteTitle ""]
[BlackUrl "https://www.chess.com/bundles/web/images/noavatar_l.84a92436.gif"]
[BlackCountry "164"]
[BlackTitle ""]

1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 {Vienna Game: Max Lange Defense, Vienna Gambit} 3...
Bb4 {An interesting Zhuravlev-ish move [+0.3]} 4. Qg4 $5 {[%c_effect
g4;square;g4;type;Interesting;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] Very interesting
according to Stockfish analysis, this is a mistake, which makes it different to
the Zhuravlev [-1.3]. However, it's a tricky move that Black needs to navigate
carefully.} 4... Qf6 $4 {[%c_effect f6;square;f6;type;Blunder;persistent;true]
However, this is a blunder where Black will lose a rook $1 [+4]} 5. Nd5 $1
{[%c_effect d5;square;d5;type;GreatFind;persistent;true][%c_arrow
d5f6;keyPressed;none;from;d5;opacity;0.8;to;f6;persistent;false,d5c7;keyPressed;none;from;d5;opacity;0.8;to;c7;persistent;false,c7a8;keyPressed;none;from;c7;opacity;0.8;to;a8;persistent;false,c7e8;keyPressed;none;from;c7;opacity;0.8;to;e8;persistent;false][%c_highlight
f6;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;f6;persistent;false,c7;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;c7;persistent;false]
The powerful tactic in the Vienna, queen's knight to d5 $1} 5... Qg6 6. Qxg6 hxg6
7. Nxc7+ Ke7 $6 {[%c_arrow
e8d8;keyPressed;none;from;e8;opacity;0.8;to;d8;persistent;false][%c_highlight
d8;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;d8;persistent;false][%c_effect
e7;square;e7;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true] A bit of an inaccuracy [+5.2]} 8.
Nxa8 Bd6 9. c3 exf4 10. d4 f6 11. Ne2 g5 12. d5 Ne5 13. Nd4 Bb8 14. Nb5 Kd8 15.
c4 Nh6 16. h3 b6 17. Be2 Ba6 18. a4 Bxb5 19. axb5 Nhf7 20. Nxb6 $6 {[%c_arrow
c4c5;keyPressed;none;from;c4;opacity;0.8;to;c5;persistent;false][%c_highlight
c5;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;c5;persistent;false][%c_effect
b6;square;b6;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true] Advancing the c-pawn is the more
principled approach. I decided to take a riskier one to try to simplify and
induce errors, which Stockfish considers to be inaccuracy [+4.3 $37 +3]} 20...
axb6 21. Ra6 Kc7 22. b4 Nd6 23. c5 bxc5 24. bxc5 Ndc4 $6 {[%c_arrow
d6e4;keyPressed;none;from;d6;opacity;0.8;to;e4;persistent;false][%c_highlight
e4;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;e4;persistent;false][%c_effect
c4;square;c4;type;Inaccuracy;persistent;true] And in a sense, by trying to force
open the queenside worked with Black playing inaccurately [+6.2]} 25. Bxc4 Nxc4
26. d6+ Kb7 27. Ra4 Ne5 28. Kd2 {Needed to defend the d3 from Black's knight}
28... Rc8 29. Ba3 Ba7 30. Rc1 Ka8 $4 {[%c_effect
a8;square;a8;type;Blunder;keyPressed;undefined;persistent;true] Black's king
tries to hide away from the closing ring of pawns, but this was a game ending
blunder [+10] as the bishop is now pinned} 31. b6 {[%c_effect
d2;square;d2;type;Winner,a8;square;a8;type;ResignBlack][%c_arrow
a4a7;keyPressed;none;from;a4;opacity;0.8;to;a7;persistent;false,a7a8;keyPressed;none;from;a7;opacity;0.8;to;a8;persistent;false,b6a7;keyPressed;none;from;b6;opacity;0.8;to;a7;persistent;false][%c_highlight
a7;keyPressed;none;opacity;0.8;square;a7;persistent;false] Place pressure on the
pinned piece; GG $1} 1-0