In today's chess video, we are going to look
at one of the most famous games in Chess history
played between Stepan Levitsky and Frank Marshall.
This game is popularly known as the ‘Gold
Coins game’ because it is believed that
spectators showered gold coins after the final
move by Marshall.
Let's begin.
Levitsky is playing as white and Marshall
is playing with the black pieces.
Levitsky started with d4, Marshall played
e6.
Then comes E4 taking control of the center.
Black played d5, transposing into the French
Defense.
Then knight c3, defending e4.
And then Marshall comes up with an unusual
looking move, pawn to c5.
Actually, Marshall was quite famous for his
opening tricks and traps and this seems to
be another one of those Gambits.
But anyways, Levitsky didn’t fall for it
and he continued with knight f3.
Knight c6.
White takes the pawn, black takes back.
And then Levitsky goes for bishop e2 preparing
to castle.
This seems like a slow move, a much aggressive
move could have been bishop b5, pinning the
knight, but white chose bishop e2 instead.
Black develops his knight.
White castles Kingside, as expected.
Now Black plays bishop e7, preparing to castle.
Then comes bishop g5 attacking the knight.
Black castles kingside.
Finally, white decides to take this pawn.
And now this d pawn is under threat, therefore,
black defends it with bishop e6.
Then white centralizes his knight.
Bishop takes on c5, attacking the knight.
Here, Levitsky took the bishop with his knight,
which is not that great of a move because
after black takes with the pawn, he gets 2
powerful central Pawns and also this semi-open
file for his rook to attack the kingside.
After this, white went for bishop g4, attacking
this e6 pawn.
Black cannot take with the knight because
it is pinned to the queen.
Therefore, Marshall goes for queen d6 removing
the pin and also defending this pawn.
White saves his bishop moving it back to h3.
Now black brings his other rook into action,
moving it to e8.
Then white goes for queen d2 connecting his
rooks.
Then bishop b4, pinning the knight and threatening
knight e4 which can lead to some very nasty
attacks like these.
Therefore, Levitsky decided to take the knight
and black recaptured with his rook.
White brings his other rook into the game
and then comes queen c5, putting additional
pressure on this knight.
Now white goes for a nice little tactical
idea.
He first plays queen to e2.
Black takes with the bishop, pawn takes and
then queen takes.
White sacrifices his pawn temporarily.
On the next move, Levitsky regains his pawn
by taking with his rook.
Now black cannot take that rook because that
leads to a checkmate in the next few moves,
just like this.
Therefore, in this position, Marshall did
not take the rook and went for knight d4,
attacking the queen.
We have reached a critical point in the game
and here's where white blundered.
The best move was queen e4 because it maintains
pressure on this important e6 square and also
attacks the knight.
Anyways, what Levitsky played in the game
was queen h5, attacking the rook.
This allowed black to simply double up his
rooks on this dangerous f file.
Now White's rook is in trouble so he saves
it by moving it to e5.
Now Marshall could have simply captured on
f2 because of White's backrank issues.
But instead of that, he decided to play rook
h6, attacking the queen.
For white, queen g4 is not a good option because
after the following move sequence, white loses
this active rook.
Therefore, in this position, Levitsky played
queen g5.
Now fasten your seat belts because we have
2 glorious moves coming up.
First, Marshall took the bishop.
Taking with the pawn would lead to disaster
because knight f3 is a family fork and white
loses his queen.
Therefore, in this position, white tried rook
to c5, attacking the queen.
As you can see, Black is completely dominating
this game and there are many ways in which
he can finish things off.
But!
What was played was one of the most dramatic
moves of the century, which awarded this game
the title of ‘American Beauty’.
Well - Marshall went for an epic - Queen to
g3, the most beautiful move that could have
been played in this position.
In fact, it is said that the spectators showered
gold coins on the board after this move.
This was the final nail in the coffin, after
which Levitsky resigned.
Let's see why!
Even though White had a lot of options, none
of them actually work.
Let's look at them one by one.
See, black is threatening a checkmate on the
next move with queen h2, so White has got
to do something about it.
If he takes the queen with the h pawn, then
knight e2 is straightaway, checkmate.
If he takes with the f pawn, then again it
leads to a forced checkmate, just like this.
If he looks to free up some squares for the
king to escape like rook b1 for example.
Again it results in a checkmate, just like
this.
Going back, if he tries f4 to free this square
for the king, then black can go for knight
e2 and ultimately, queen h2 to mate the white
king, just like this.
Another thing he could try is maybe queen
e5, attacking this diagonal.
But then, black can go for knight f3 check,
King h1 is forced and then rook h2 is a checkmate.
Finally, you might think what happens if white
simply takes with the queen.
Well, then comes knight e2 check.
King h1 is forced.
Then knight takes the queen with check.
Taking with the h pawn is obviously not possible.
Taking with the f pawn results in a checkmate
like this.
Therefore, white has to move his king.
Again, knight e2 check, King h1 and now black
can save his rook to end up with an extra
piece which is a match winning advantage.
Okay, so here's a Chess puzzle for you all.
It is White's turn and you need to find the
winning move for white.
Do share your answers in the comments section
below.
Here's another video that you absolutely must
watch - it's a famous Mikhail Tal game!
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See you in the next one!
