This game is quite remarkable not only because a chess master like Reuben Fine, playing Black, resigned after only 7 moves but even more so because his opponent moved only pawns! I found this game in the collection "1000 Best Short Games of Chess" by Irving Chernev. The games in there are really short and the book is more a collection of opening traps than of high-level master games. However, many games in there are really fun to play through, like this one where Borochow traps Fine's knights with his pawns.

The game starts with Alekhine's Defense (1. e4 Nf6). This Defense to the King's Pawn Opening was named after Alexander Alekhine who first used it in 1921. The opening belongs to the hypermodern chess openings because it does not attempt to occupy the center. Rather, it provokes White to attack the knight with 2. e5 which he promptly does in this game. After Black moves his knight to d5, White continues to attack it with 3. c4. Black is now forced to move the knight once more to b6. After White plays 4. d4 to support his weak e-pawn, Black should have played 4. ... d6 but in this game Fine chose to develop the second knight with 4. ... Nc6 instead, falling in a trap because the black knights do not have enough space to evade the continued attacks from White's pawns.

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written by Will8, June 20, 2007

nice trick gotta remember this for my games!

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written by Sciurus, June 20, 2007

I for my part won't start memorizing opening traps - it is probably not all that productive to make moves with the goal to build traps because one has to rely on the opponent to blunder and fall into the trap. But it is good to know some common traps that can be played against you in your openings.

Said that, I think that this miniature is quite fun to play through and there are many more in the game collection.

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written by Robert, June 25, 2007

I don't quite get it ... Why did he resign? Because he saw that he would lose a knight so early in the game?

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written by Sciurus, June 25, 2007

Yes, he resigned because of the loss of the knight. As far as I know, high-level players often resign even if they lose a pawn early in the game (without compensation that is, otherwise there would be no gambit play).

I may have continued playing for a while myself because there's always a chance of my opponent making a blunder. However, I am often asking myself if it wouldn't be better to just resign after significant material loss and use the time for another game - after all it is not that much fun to defend against superior material.

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written by Trooper, July 09, 2007

That's a bad opening by Black anyway. A few beginner opponents of mine have done that, and lost terribly. Maybe moving the Knight off to the side is okay, but not moving it to the center whe it's open to pawn attack...

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written by Sciurus, July 10, 2007

Trooper:
The Alekhine Defense is weird (at least to me). Moving the knight to the center in move 2 is actually a book move and from what I understand it is normal that Black has to live with a cramped position for a while. But I agree that such moves are risky, particularly if you are a beginner with low tactics skills. I provide examples for this myself when playing the Scandinavian - people start chasing my exposed Q and even though the Scandinavian is pretty solid I lose because I fall in some trap...

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