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Top Ten Games Of Richard Réti- #8- The Greek Gift
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Top Ten Games Of Richard Réti- #8- The Greek Gift

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tactics tactics tactics... we see them everywhere, which is why we practice them over and over again. As the tactics get harder, they show more precise sacrifices, which get harder to solve correctly. Along this path, you will pick up a sacrifice called the "greek gift", which involves giving up a knight so that your opponent has an uncastlable, weak king, getting its name from the trojan war (I made a full post on it here)

Generally, it is ideally played when the kingside is already weak from the lack of defenders, and this is sort of a ruse to tear away the fortress and to bring the king into the exposed open wilderness. But in this game against Akiba Rubinstein, if the king were to take the knight, not only would it be unsafe and troublesome, but it would also hang the queen.

The game starts with Réti playing e4, with GM Akiba Rubinstein replying with d5, turning it into the Scandinavian, which was widely played at this time (2-3% of all games played), so it wasn't uncommon. This opening is known to have a lot of simple positions, where the opening principles of controlling the center and casting early apply, rather than a game where pawns were made into confusing positions. Réti then took the pawn on e4, and Akiba captured back while turning the center almost empty.

The mainline for this move- The ideal one as time has shown to be best- is 3.Nf3. With this move Réti sparks the battle for e5, attacks the queen, and develops a knight at the same time, but gets replied  Qa5, so the queen can still control the a-rank, and if Réti ever decides to move the d pawn, the knight will become pinned. The last book move played was Nf3, and now you will notice Réti has a huge advancement in development.

While the center is vigorously controlled by the two knights, it become clear that black should regain some space. So with Nc6, Akiba gains some lost space. But the engine doesn't like this move, particularly because of the pin, and the exact same goals could be achieved by moving the other knight Bb5 was played, and it is now a classic standoff between knight pins to the king. This move was the best was to refute the minor inaccuracy that Akiba just played, but the advantage went close to zero when black put his bishop in the way of the pin (Bd7), while Réti castles away from the future pins. 

The idea for black would be a6, (Bc4 but that move just isn't humanlike for this time) Bxc6, Bg4, h3, Bxf3, Qxf3, and then e6, But Akiba made an unfortunate error and played e6 first, letting the white bishop stay in its solid position. Akiba's Ideas for making this mistake were clear, he wanted to objectively reinforce the queens line with the bishop, or to get ready for castling, but there was no pin anymore. This move.. didn't really accomplish much. You can see all the different ways black could have gone in the diagram below.

To prevent the somewhat scary idea of Akiba dominating the center with e5, The guy with nice sunglasses goes d5, to establish a complete control over e5. But, that removes the defender on the knight and Akiba takes advantage of that with Bb4, and Réti makes the unornate mistake of Qd3, which eventually leads to double pawns after Bxc3, bxc3 (ok yes that is pretty cool same annotations), but the pawns will be a trouble in the endgame, because they act like one singular pawn.

Look at the black queen. It has one move it can go without being captured, mainly because the bishop immobilizes the queens whole a file. The general idea is to either clear a way for the queen, or to create an out with pawns, but since there is virtually no way the queen can escape with the pawn idea, the sensible thing is to push the bishop away. Luckily for Akiba, he still owns his a pawn which when he moved it with a3, it forces the bishop either to capture or to move away. Staying would mean capture. 

After a6, the bishop goes to the only place it can go, with Bc4, And Akiba develops a knight to g7, with Neg7. Now lets take a look at the next two moves played, 6.Rb1, and 6.Rb8. As whites turn, Réti slides the rook and takes over the majority of the b file, while piling up the pressure and pondering weather Akiba will castle now that he no longer has control of queenside, but the kingside is also underdeveloped and weak. But before he can strengthen the kingside for castling, he must defend the queenside, which led to him mimicking the move.

Further empowering the attack, the game continues with Ng5?!. The engine does not like, but I think it is a good move because now black cant castle on either side, and it creates a more playable game, with a lot more attacks, but the engine wants to hold on to the center. At this point, black doesn't have any general moves, so they lash out an attack with Qf5?! It is very clear at this point that the queen is very valuable- giving it up would mean wreaking the attack twofold, so the game goes onward with Qg3, avoiding the exchange and giving up a pawn for a better tactical position.

The black king takes the gambited pawn, and Réti plays Bd3!, where we see the same theme as before, where we would trap the queen so it becomes useless, making it so the queen has very few spaces it can go where it becomes strong. Akiba takes another gambited pawn with his queen, but now that both bishops are out and active, the attack on the kingside is stronger than ever, sparking the idea of the greek gift (Nxf7!!)

Generally speaking, it might be a good idea to castle but after Nxf7, 0-0, Bxh7!!, (King takes knight Kxf7,Qxc3 down a queen now), Qxc3 and that is definitely not winning. The only good move, in fact the only move that salvages this position is Nf5!, which doesn't force, but strongly suggests to trade off some major attacks. Réti takes it. 

It is met with Réti trading his queen, with both Qxg3 and fxg3, where Akiba safely castles away from threats. The attack may seem almost lost, but there is still some play on both sides

A quick recap- 

It was horribly played by both sides.

First with the mistake of Réti moving the bishop into an attack that doesn't lead anywhere, (Ba3?), Then Akiba has a choice of two pieces to capture, and he makes the mistake of choosing the wrong one, (Kxf7?), where Réti reply's with hanging a pawn, (Ba3?), and Akiba completely misses the free pawn with Be6, and sets up a fork for Réti at the same time, but thankfully he sees it. Fast forward a few moves, and Akiba moves his knight to a square were it looses half its power, (Na5?!) and Réti makes an inaccuracy, and moved his rook in the wrong spot (Re1+) (Ideally this is best Rd1, Nc4, Re2+, Kf7 and the king is far away from helping) 

After that the horrors are over and a couple of good moves are played, the attack is back, but on the queenside this time. Can you find the move that led Réti to have another astonishing one point advantage? 

well not incredibly difficult to see, but Chesss.com pegged it as brilliant.
But look at the king. It is so trapped, that if it moves anywhere, it will loose two pawns. But if it doesn't move, it will stay in its uncomfortable position.

The endgame, is something to learn from. Both players can easily mess it up, but they both always find the best move. Akiba is careful to avoid taking poisoned pawns, and Réti slowly but surely picks off enemy pawns, first with 40.Rxa6, then with 47.Rxb5, and then Akiba makes the mistake of offering a pawn exchange, so Réti happily accepted with  49.gxh5 leaving the other pawn prone to 54.Rxh4, leaving black with a singular passed pawn and a rook.

If, Réti manages to force a rook trade, and sac the bishop for the pawn, then it will be a basic endgame for him.

Kind of basic endgame there... But it doesn't mean it was bad.

 Top Ten Games Of Réti

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