Well, for a start I'd be thinking that 5.d4 makes much more sense than 5.Nd5. Why cede the centre and exchange pieces? White is ahead in development, black has marginally weakened his kingside and wont be able to castle for a little while - I don't believe in just playing passively against this sort of stuff.

So, after 5.d4 it would appear that we are in Terra Incognita - can anyone chart a route for black here? Though as I'm away from home I don't have my trusty engines to back me up, I'm fairly confident white must have some edge here. The sort of thing I'd be looking at is 5...fxe4 6.dxe5! exf3 7.exf6 Qxf6 8.O-O! and looking to plant something down the e-file before black gets close to castling. 8...Bxc3 seems forced, but after 9.bxc3 white has an open position and two bishops and a lead in development for his dodgy pawn structure.

So 5...exd4 must be the move (since I can see no sensible way for black to maintain the central tension). Then 6.Nxd4 fxe4 (what else) is quite strongly met by 7.Bg5!? again striving for activity and preventing ...d5. I can't believe that this is what black wants? White is the one having all the fun here...

What would black play after 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Nf3?

4...fxe4 5.Nxe5 d5 6.Nxd5! and black doesn't get his Svedenborg fun - 6...Nxd5 7.Qh5+ g6 8.Nxg6 hg 9.Qxh8 Nb4 10.O-O and I don't believe white can be bad here, though maybe black has just enough?

So, does black have an improvement on this? Or am I totally mis-assessing the position?

Pardon my ignorance, but isn't 3.Bc4 still supposed to be quite strong against the Latvian?  If so, then this issue is moot.

Markovich wrote on 04/03/12 at 15:38:20:


There's one game with that:

3.Bxg8 is a completely unprincipled move, so I would never look for White's advantage in that direction.

I think I would look first at the reversed Falkbeer with B-QB4 thrown in. That's not just any extra move, it's White's QB sitting on the just-exposed diagonal.  I suppose 3.d3 must be good, but it doesn't look like a sufficiently sharp reaction to Black's bad move.

It's a very cute idea for Latvian players, though.

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 f5 4.d4! is indeed the problem with the Rousseau Gambit (we've already seen that 1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 f5 3.d4 exd4 isn't anywhere near as convincing for White).
I find Jon's analysis quite convincing, in the sense that while 2...f5 may not equalise with as much certainty as 2...Nf6 it seems that Black always gets a playable position with some counterplay.

Thank you very much for your analysis Jon. You've nearly convinced me to play 2...f5 the next time someone plays 2.Bc4 against me!