Good Game

It's a nice game, and good tactics.

Are you familiar with Bird Opening Theory? After 1... c5, it is preferrable to play 2. Nf3, rather than transpose, as you did, into the Old Benoni Defence where you had played a rather useless 2. f4. A typical line could have gone:

1. f4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. g3 g6 4. Bg2 Bg7 5. O-O.

I did not say that 1. f4 was useless. I said that 2. f4 is useless. As you basically transposed into the Old Benoni Defence (1. d4 c5) you were effectively playing 2. f4. Look at it as though your first two moves were the other way round, and you will see why it was a bad choice.

As it happens, I think 1. f4 is an excellent move and play it often OTB, but that is not the case in hand.

Who cares? His opponent definitely failed to show what was wrong with his setup. And certainly neither player had the ideas of the Old Benoni in mind!

I'd rather critize black, who was apparently thinking "hmm... 1.f4... I'm still going to play my d6 Sicilian! 2.d4... I'm STILL going to play my d6 Sicilian!!". (or perhaps he didn't think like that at all, who knows)

Well Scarblac, although he didn't get refuted and it did work out in the end, that doesn't make it a good move! You could critize black, but you could equally critisize white for that move (no offence! ) whether he won or not.

Well, I'm not sure that a computer would give it a mistake, probably an inaccuracy, but consider this- the chess.com opening explorer contains over 15,000 games in the Old Benoni Defence, and only 2 games where f4 is played. So, the top players certainly don't seem to hold it in high esteem.

True. But I don't think that, if you want to explain why after 1.f4 c5, 2.d4 is bad, you just say that after 1.d4 c5, 2.f4 is useless and leave it at that!

I think that whether it's good or bad depends on 2...cxd4. Now her intended 3.e3 is in my opinion really bad, it just gives away an important pawn. 3.Qxd4 Nc6 is also nothing to write home about.

But after 3.Nf3 intending Nxd4 (and perhaps e4) I think that white isn't worse. Play might end up in some normal Open Sicilian with f4, but both white and black have extra options (e.g., 1.f4 c5 2.d4 cxd4 3.Nf3 Nc6 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Qb6 6.e3!? seems equalish). Or do you have a clear path to advantage for black?

Oops! Sorry!

Ok, that's true, but I don't have infinite time to go into opening lines-  I just felt that was the best sum-up, or the best representation of what I was trying to say.

I do not have a clear path to victory for black. But as my post above yours points out- 2. f4 certainly isn't move of the century.

I don't think this transposes into an Old Benoni, really. I mean, there white plays 1.d4 c5 2.d5. Anything else and the play isn't really Benoni-like anyway. So it's a bit of a red herring to call 1.f4 c5 2.d4 a transposition to it.

But let's stop discussing the first two moves only :-)

Did you consider 29.a4 with the idea of playing Bc4+ ? If Black moves the b-pawn. And if 29...c4, then 30.Bc2 and axb5 soon. Opening up a new front there would have been good for white, I think. Am I right that you were trying the same thing with 29.c4?

For the rest of the game, I don't see many improvements right now. Mostly you did solid moves and now and then your opponent made a mistake...

That doesn't lose a tempo, as your opponent's c5-c4 would also have cost a tempo.

After 29.c4 b4, your own pawns block your bishop, so to keep it on the best square, you made it into a worse square :-)

By the way, not saying that a4 was better, haven't looked at it much, just an idea that came to mind when I played through the game.

With all this talk about gambits You should just be playing e4 openings right now. There are a lot of gambits that you could look up. Queen pawn openings are generally thought to be more "closed" openings at least to start. Positional. Not the active openings you are interested in. See Paul Morphy games. Try the Kings gambit or the gambit line against the Sicilian. The Scotch gambit. Sounds like that would fit your style. Good luck