Showing posts with label chess. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chess. Show all posts

The Fabulous Budapest Gambit: Much More Than Just a Sharp Surprise Weapon Review

The Fabulous Budapest Gambit: Much More Than Just a Sharp Surprise Weapon
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The Fabulous Budapest Gambit: Much More Than Just a Sharp Surprise Weapon ReviewI used to answer 1 d4 with 1...d5 or 1...f5. But in a couple of tournaments, I decided to try the Budapest Gambit, which I thought was unsound at the time.
It is not unsound. As a matter of fact, my opponents, when they were not busy avoiding my gambit with 1 d4 Nf6 2 Nf3 (which generally led to a Queen's Indian Defense), made a bizarre array of bad moves, hanging material and even getting mated quickly a couple of times.
As Moskalenko explains, the stem game of the Budapest was Adler-Maroczy, in 1896. After 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e5 3 dxe5 Ng4 4 Nf3 Bc5 5 e3 Nc6 6 Qd5 Qe7 7 Nc3 Nge5 8 Be2 d6 9 Ne4, Maroczy could have played 9...Nb4 with an excellent position. In fact, he played 9...Be6 and still won very quickly. In my first game with the Budapest, I played the same initial six moves as Maroczy. The game continued 7 e6 dxe6 8 Qh5 e5 9 Nc3 Nb4 and I won easily against a higher rated opponent. "How come everything is better than what I played?" she asked after the game.
In Adler's attack, a better line is 6 Nc3 O-O 7 Be2 Re8 8 O-O Nxe5 9 Nxe5 Nxe5 10 b3 a5 11 Bb2 Ra6. Yes, that piece on a6 is "Drimer's Rook," or as I call it, the "Budapest Castle." And Moskalenko shows us that once on a6, it tends to sail across the board to h6, where it threatens the White King. An example is 12 Ne4 Ba7 13 Qd5 Rh6 14 Bxe5 c6, which the author tells us about in detail.
I had always thought that Black would be in trouble if White played the following attack: 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e5 3 dxe5 Ng4 4 Bf4 Nc6 5 Nf3 Bb4+ 6 Nbd2 Qe7 7 e3 Ngxe5 8 Nxe5 Nxe5 9 Be2. But Moskalenko has some suggestions here, including 9...d6 10 O-O a5 11 Nb3 a4 12 a3 Bc3 13 bxc3 axb3, which I think is just fine for Black.
Of course, White can play 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e5 3 d5. Here, the author recommends 3...b5. I like this: we continue in the Hungarian tradition by switching to a sort of Benko Gambit!
In one of my Budapest games, White tried 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e5 3 dxe5 Ng4 4 Qd4 d6 5 exd6. Here, Moskalenko wants 5...Bxd6 (if 6 Qxg7? 6...Be5! wins for Black). But I played 5...Nc6 6 Qe4+ Be6 7 dxc7 (if 7 f3 Nf6 8 Qc2 Bxd6 9 e3, I think 9...Nb4 is good for Black) 7...Qd1+ (I found this move, which I called the "Jill Gambit," over the board in an earlier game, unable to resist the prospect of a family plan fork) 8 Kxd1 Nxf2+ 9 Kc2 Nb4+ (it's interesting to see how often Black plays 9...Nb4 in the Budapest) 10 Kb3 Nxe4 11 Nh3? a5! (this mate threat wins material) 12 Nc3? Nc5+ 13 Ka3 Nc2 mate.
In any case, this book is up-to-date and includes a great deal of explanatory material about strategies for both sides in this interesting gambit. I highly recommend it.
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The Queen's Gambit Accepted: A Sharp and Sound Response to 1 d4 (Batsford Chess Opening Guides) Review

The Queen's Gambit Accepted: A Sharp and Sound Response to 1 d4 (Batsford Chess Opening Guides)
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The Queen's Gambit Accepted: A Sharp and Sound Response to 1 d4 (Batsford Chess Opening Guides) Review(My rating would be two-and-a-half stars if that were possible.)
I'm a master who's played the QGA on and off for about 20 years. My other reference works were getting old, so I got a copy of Ward's book. The parts I've read so far have disappointed me.
He spends a bit more than 1/3 of the pages on the 3.e4 lines, writing, "If the QGA is to be refuted, then 3 e4 is probably the place for White players to look." This statement is puzzling. He's implying that there could be a _refutation_ to the QGA (an eye-opening claim), and he says nothing of the likelihood that White can get an _advantage_ in this line, rather than in other lines (a more useful consideration).
I don't know the e4 lines well, but I'm familiar with other QGA lines. He skips over some significant variations in those. Two examples:
A) In the line 1.d4 d5 2.c4 dxc4 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.e3 Bg4 5.Bxc4 e6, he doesn't analyze a common Black setup built around the moves a6, Nc6, and Bd6. [In a note -- not his regular analysis -- he mentions one game that began that way, in which White played weirdly and got into trouble.]
B) In the line 1.d4 d5 2.c4 dxc4 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Nc3, he never mentions one of Black's sensible responses, 4. ... Nc6, which has been played many times.
Skipping lines such as these would make sense if this were a repertoire book, advising the Black player to choose certain variations. But it's not; it's a survey of the entire opening. Of course, you can never include every little subvariation of an opening, but the two I mentioned are hardly obscure.
Ward does a nice job of describing some positional ideas in his analysis (rather than just complex variations). However, as he analyzes games, he focuses much more on the moves actually played than on possibly superior alternatives, which he either omits or glosses over.
This book could also have used better editing and proofreading. A few examples:
1. Page 91: "The queen had look after the knight."
2. Page 100: a note mentions the move h5 for Black, but it should have been Bh5.
3. Page 103: a note says "As we shall see elsewhere," referring to something that happens in other games, but we are not told where to find those games.
4. Page 154: the text reads "It's inconceivable" when it clearly should have said "It's conceivable."
A book by a grandmaster on an important opening raises the reader's hopes -- too much so in this case. If I were a specialist in 3.e4, I might have a much better view of this book. From my perspective, though, it merits no more than a lukewarm recommendation.The Queen's Gambit Accepted: A Sharp and Sound Response to 1 d4 (Batsford Chess Opening Guides) Overview

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