C41 Philidor Defence (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 f6)

This game was played in a tournament called 2014 September Grand Seven Fourteen III and it is held at Red Hot Pawn. In this 21 player tournament there are still seven players that can win it and I am one of the lucky ones still included in the fight for the win. There is unfortunately large rating scale in this tournament as the lowest rated player is rated 881 at the moment and the highest rated player is rated 1938. Well, even if there is a huge rating difference between these two players, it does not mean that this tournament would be clear as to who wins and who will hold the last place at the end of the tournament. That is because there are also players close their rating who can make things more interesting. The game below is just one example of those huge rating differences in this tournament that are unfortunately occuring. I don't think games where there is this huge rating gap between players is all that beneficial to either player. Then again, accidents do happen and I think I lost to a player who was rated 800 or so points lower rated than me because I missed the mate in one threat he did...

This game deviated from the games that I have previously seen in my games when my opponent played 3...f6. The other two tries in that position were in the previous games 3...h6 and 3...Bg4. The latter option is better than 3...h6 or the move jayvi tried in this game, 3...f6, but the best option for Black might be 3...exd4. The third move of my opponent already gave me a clear advantage. In the position below my opponent played 4...Ne7, which could have been the losing move.

I replied with the inccurate move 5.O-O and while it was not the best move, I still remained on the clearly better side of the board. The best reply was 5.dxe5. Jayvi's position continued to go downhill with the move 5...d5, after which the game is quite lost for my opponent. The game did not last long after this and my opponent resigned after my 10th move Nd4.

[Event "Grand Seven Fourteen"] [Site "http://www.redhotpawn.com"] [Date "2014.09.11"] [Round "1"] [White "Vierjoki, Timo"] [Black "jayvi"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "C41"] [WhiteElo "1871"] [BlackElo "925"] [Annotator "Stockfish 8 64 POPCNT (30s), TV"] [PlyCount "19"] [EventDate "2014.??.??"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 {Philidor Defense} f6 {C41 Philidor Defence} (3... f5 4. Nc3 {Philidor Defense: Philidor Countergambit. Zukertort Variation}) (3... exd4 4. Qxd4 Bd7 {Philidor Defense: Boden Variation}) (3... Nd7 4. Bc4 c6 5. c3 {Philidor Defense: Hanham Variation. Delmar Variation} (5. Nc3 {Philidor Defense: Hanham Variation. Schlechter Variation})) 4. Bc4 Ne7 5. O-O (5. dxe5 dxe5 6. Bf7+ Kxf7 7. Qxd8 Na6 8. Nc3 Nc6 9. Qd1 Bc5 10. Be3 Rd8 11. Qe2 Nd4 12. Bxd4 exd4 13. Nb1 Re8 14. Nbd2 f5 15. e5 Bd6 16. O-O-O Be7 17. Nxd4 Bg5 18. Qh5+ Kf8 19. Qxg5 Nc5 {Kappe,B (2013)-Farmani Anosheh,M Germany 2009 1-0}) (5. c3 b6 6. Qb3 d5 7. exd5 Nf5 8. dxe5 fxe5 9. O-O Bb7 10. Re1 Nd7 11. Nxe5 Nxe5 12. Rxe5+ Ne7 13. Bb5+ c6 14. dxc6 Rb8 15. c7+ Bc6 16. Bxc6+ Qd7 17. cxb8=Q# { 1-0 (17) Mitrovic, R (1986)-Lazic,M Valjevo 2016}) 5... d5 $4 $146 {terrible, but what else could Black do to save the game?} (5... c6 6. dxe5 fxe5 7. Ng5 d5 8. Qf3 Qd7 9. Qf7+ Kd8 10. Rd1 Ng6 11. exd5 Kc7 12. Ne6+ Kb6 13. Qf3 c5 14. Qb3+ {1-0 (14) Zwanenbeek,I-Hartog,J Haarlem 1987}) (5... Ng6 6. Nc3 Bg4 7. Be3 Nd7 8. h3 Bxf3 9. Qxf3 Nb6 10. Bb3 Qd7 11. a4 Qe7 12. a5 Nd7 13. Nd5 Qd8 14. Qf5 Be7 15. f4 c6 16. Nxe7 Qxe7 17. a6 b6 18. Qg4 O-O-O 19. f5 Ngf8 20. Qe2 { Milanovic, J-Kozomara,D Prijedor 2015 1-0}) (5... h6 6. c3 b6 7. Qb3 Bg4 8. Bb5+ c6 9. Be2 h5 10. h3 Bd7 11. Be3 Ng6 12. Rd1 Qe7 13. d5 cxd5 14. Qxd5 Bc6 15. Qc4 b5 16. Qd3 a6 17. c4 b4 18. Qc2 a5 19. Nbd2 Qd7 20. c5 {Deventer,D (1354) -Marangoz,A Olpe 2005 1-0 (51)}) (5... Nbc6 $142 $16) 6. exd5 $18 Nxd5 ( 6... Nd7 {is the last straw} 7. dxe5 Nxe5 8. Nxe5 fxe5 9. Qh5+ Ng6 $18) 7. dxe5 Be6 (7... Be7 {does not win a prize} 8. Bxd5 c6 9. exf6 gxf6 10. Bc4 Qxd1 11. Rxd1 $18) 8. exf6 gxf6 (8... Nc6 {does not solve anything} 9. Ng5 Nxf6 10. Nxe6 Qxd1 11. Rxd1 $18) 9. Re1 Kf7 (9... Ne7 {is still a small chance} 10. Qxd8+ Kxd8 11. Bxe6 Ng6 $18) 10. Nd4 (10. Nd4 h5 11. Nxe6 $18) 1-0