Cultivating Error

Fast chess rewards weakness. Playing for cheap traps and succeeding stifles progress. Having spent many hours studying the games of Gioachino Greco, I have succeeded numerous times in replicating his best known miniature. This morning against a player with a Lichess rating near 2200, I found my opponent unprepared to meet the transparent threats offered in the not quite sound Greco Attack.

After this victory, and my postgame analysis, I decided that I have had enough. If I am to continue playing the Greco Attack, I must shift to the Aitken variation. Below is the game.

Stripes,J (2096) -- Internet Opponent (2153) [C54]
Rated Rapid game lichess.org, 01.11.2021
[Stripes,James]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4 exd4 6.cxd4

6.e5 is better, according to William Lewis, Gioachino Greco on the Game of Chess (1819), which Lewis presents as a translation of a French collection of Greco's games.

6...Bb4+ 7.Nc3?!

7.Bd2 Nxe4 8.Bxb4 Nxb4 9.Bxf7+ Kxf7 10.Qb3+ is in the Ordini manuscript (1594) from the Polerio-complex. See "Greco Attack Before Greco".

7...Nxe4=/+ 8.0-0

Black to move

8...Nxc3

8...Bxc3 9.d5 is in Greco's Mountstephen manuscript (1623). It is the better move.

9.bxc3 Bxc3

The equalizing 9...d5 does not seem to appear among late-sixteenth century or seventeenth century manuscripts. It was played by Moller in 1902, according to ChessBase Mega 2020.

10.cxb4 dxc4 11.Re1+ Ne7 with equal chances: 0-1 (48) Piotrowski,O-Moller,J Hannover 1902.

White to move

10.Qb3?

I play this move because I get away with it. I have even told students, erroneously, that White is now winning.

10.Ba3 is Aitken's suggestion 10...d5 11.Bb5 Bxa1 12.Re1+ Be6 13.Qc2 Qd7 14.Ne5+-. See also Corte -- Bolbochán 1946 (2016).

10...Bxa1??

Now Black is lost. Black is also lost after 10...Bxd4, which also appears in Greco.

10...d5 11.Bxd5 0-0+/= (11...Bxa1?? 12.Bxf7+ Kf8 13.Ba3+ Ne7 14.Re1+- is credited to Don Antonio in the Doazan manuscript, which precedes Greco. Greco may have seen this manuscript.)

11.Bxf7+ Kf8 12.Bg5 Ne7 13.Ne5!

Greco's innovation, building on the work of Polerio and his associates.

Black to move

Greco analyzes several variations from this point. This game follows one of them.

13...Bxd4 14.Bg6 d5 15.Qf3+ Bf5 16.Bxf5 Bxe5 17.Be6+ Bf6 18.Bxf6 Qe8N

Black's move is the first new one.

White to move

19.Be5+ 

My last move misses checkmate in three. Nonetheless, Black resigned.

19.Bg5+ (or Bh4+) 19... Nf5 20.Qxf5+ Qf7 21.Qxf7#

I won because my opponent missed several well-known opportunities. 10.Ba3 avoids some of these.