1 reply to this topic

[lioncub]

Hi Javier,

Encountered an unusual response playing black against a 2300 player.  He played 1.d4 d5 2. e4 ?! and we transposed into the Caro-Khan.

But, afterwards, I thought about the possibilities of what would happen if I take the free pawn and came up with 2...Bf5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Bc4 e6 5. d5 with Bxf7 tricks to follow.  What would be a good strategy, here for black ?

thanks

[Javier]

This is the popular Blackmar-Diemer Gambit. Thousands of games have been played with it and the conclusion is: it's not easy to play the resulting positions as black! White has very good compensation.
In my opinion, your decision to transpose into a caro-kann was not a bad one if that defence is in your repertoire.
Perhaps the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit is not entirely sound and with very accurate play, black might be able to hold on to his pawn, but unless you really know how to do that, a safer approach is to avoid it.