Knights only move forward

I played a Vienna defense yesterday evening against a very young, but equally promising player who had to be pushed a bit to accept the f3 pawn. I deviated from my normal lines, but found myself without attacking moves and lost the game.

Guido De Bouver - Deon Lee
Mechelen, 2014.


1.d4 Nf6 2.f3 d5 3.e4 dxe4 4.Nc3 Bf5 5.g5
The main alternative is 5.fxe4

5...Bg6 6.g5
another possibility is 6.h4 here, but 6...h6 seems to give b;lack the upper hand.

6...Nd5 7.Bg2 (diagram)
deviating from the normal 7.Nxe4

7...exf3 8.Nxf3 e6 9.Nh4 c6 10.0-0 (diagram)
Guess this is equal play. White's knight is misplaced on h4, but it can be exchanged any time.

10...Bd6
Choosing again the best line

11.Ne4 Bc7 (diagram)
11...Bxe4 would have been better, leaving the knight on h4 looking at nothing.

12.c4
12.Qf3 would have been equal

12...Ne7
Again the best move, 12...Nb6 places the knight away from the action.

13.Be3 0-0 14.Qb3 Nbd7 15.Rf2 (diagram)

The remainder of the game is of no interest to us - especially since my young opponent make by look like a fool by sacrificing his queen and mating me when I was a queen up :-(

But what we noticed during post mortem analysis is that all of my horsemen only moved foreward during the whole game - guess that is a typical behaviour for a gambiteer..