Vienna Game | Slice and Dice Checkmate!
#vienna #maxlange #copycat
This is a quick Vienna Game where I got a rather lovely checkmate on move 16! My opponent played the Max Lange Defense (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nc6) which then somewhat looked like the "copycat variation". However, there are some differences. Black played (3... a6) a waiting move and I had responded with (4. d3) forming a central chain of pawns before Black played the symmetrical "copycat" bishop (4... Bc5). I still had (5. Qg4) to which Black responded with the thematic (5... Qf6).
However, there is a critical difference here! A Meitner-Mieses Gambit with Nd5 (https://www.chess.com/blog/vitualis/meitner-mieses-gambit-brilliant-tactics-vs-deadpool) is not possible as the pawn on d3 now blocks the light square bishop from covering the f1 square! Allowing Qxf2+ would be losing!
So, I developed my other knight (6. Nf3) to block the f-file instead and Black plays their first serious mistake of the game. I've seen this mistake in similar positions many times before... Black loses patience and immediately attacks the bishop with their knight developed to the edge of the board (6... Nh6). This is a mistake [+2.2] and it is easy to sidestep the attack by placing the queen on the thematic parking square in these positions (7. Qg3).
Black castles kingside and with my queen now in a safe place, we now can strike with Nd5! The f6 square is often an uncomfortable position for the queen in Vienna Game lines as an attack with Nd5 is always just a move away. Black attempts to keep their queen out by move moving it to the only square other than undeveloping to d8 that also defends c7 (8... Qd6). However, here, we have the same tactical idea we saw in the Deadpool Meitner-Mieses Gambit game! Our knight can capture the c7 pawn (9. Nxc7) anyway!
Effectively, the queen is overstretched, and I lured it away from the defence of the unfortunate knight on h6, which we can now capture with an immediate threat of checkmate - Black fell for the trap [9... Qxc7 10. Bxh6]! Black is forced to advance the g-pawn to g6 to avoid mate, now critically weakening the dark squares around their king!
I now advance my h-pawn to threatening cracking open Black's kingside pawns with (11. h4) and then (12. h5)! Black has one critical move that isn't necessarily easy to see. They had to strike out with d5 to open the centre and open the diagonal for their own light square bishop. However, they play very natural human moves - preserving material by moving their rook out of the attack of my bishop and then rotating their knight towards the kingside for an extra defender. However, both moves are inaccuracies as they lose tempo and lose space, and the compounding of inaccuracies results in a Stockfish evaluation of [+14] on move 12!
So, on move 13, I strike with (13. Nxe5)! It isn't the most accurate move according to Stockfish, but it's still winning, and the idea is simple and direct. I now have a double attack with the bishop and knight on the f7 pawn so the obvious next move seems to be Bxf7+ which will be an absolute fork of the king and rook. Black, which hasn't seen the d5 move thus far, had one last chance, which they didn't take. Instead, they moved the king out of the incoming bishop fork to h8, and this was a blunder as a forced mate was now available!
I calculated a rather beautiful line, which ended up playing out - what I call a slice and dice checkmate with the bishop pair and queen! Firstly, (14. Nxf7+) and the king is forced back onto g8. Then, the knight now jumps out of the way with a discovered bishop check (15. Nd6+), with the knight also blocking the black queen's access to the dark square diagonal. Black had an opportunity to delay the agony by sacrificing their knight to block the check, but instead, moved the king back to h8. The queen now slides over to e5, slicing the dark square diagonal to h8 with checkmate! GG!
Game on chess.com: https://www.chess.com/game/live/81832377725
