Saturday, December 10, 2011

Goering gambit

I recently got an old book on the Goering gambit in the Scotch game, occuring after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 exd4 4.c3

Seems to me this awfully looks like a Blackmar Diemer gambit ??

Unfortunately the main line is 4...dxc3 5.Bc4, but 5.Nxc3 seems also quite good.

From Wikipedia :
The Göring Gambit is a relative of the Danish Gambit that starts with 4.c3. White sacrifices one or two pawns in return for a lead in development, and typically follows up by putting pressure on f7 with Bc4, Qb3 and sometimes Ng5, while Nc3-d5 is another common motif. The Oxford Companion to Chess notes that the gambit was first played at high levels by Howard Staunton in the 1840s, and the earliest game with it was probably played in 1843. The first game with the gambit accepted may be Meek vs Morphy, New York 1857. Carl Theodor Göring introduced it into master play in 1872, but while Göring's name is most often associated with the one-pawn gambit (5.Nxc3) Göring invariably used the double-pawn gambit with 5.Bc4. The gambit has been played by Ljubomir Ljubojevic, David Bronstein, Frank Marshall, and Jonathan Penrose. In casual games Alexander Alekhine often transposed to it via the move order 1.e4 e5 2.d4 exd4 3.c3 dxc3 4.Nxc3, when ...Nc6 for Black and Nf3 for White often followed. In general, the opening is unpopular at master level but is more popular at club level. It is recommended to study the Göring Gambit in connection with the Danish.

1 comment:

  1. The Göring Gambit is essentially a Blackmar-Diemer Gambit with the kings and queens swapped. As an exponent of both gambits, I find that the resulting play is often similar in nature, but the thematic ideas are often rather different- in the Göring White tends to put pressure on f7 with Bc4, Qb3 and/or Ng5, and other common themes include Nc3-d5 and meeting ...Nf6 with e4-e5.
    In my opinion the 5.Nxc3 line is fully sound.

    ReplyDelete