The Steinitz Lewis Trap occurs in the Bishop Opening where white looks to aggressively attack black’s weakened kingside. It starts with the moves:
1. e4 e5
2. Bc4 Bc5
3. b4 Bxb4
4. f4 Nc6
5. Nf3 d6
6. O-O
If black plays Bg4, pinning down the knight, white can take the pawn on f7 with Bxf7 with a devastating attack.
For more traps you can check out
Hey everyone this is kevin from Thechestwebsite.com today we’re going to Be looking at the steinis lewis trap it Derives from the bishop’s opening which Is e4 E5 and bishop to c4 now black may Respond with bishop c5 and now we’re Going to play pawn b4 this is my typical Response if they play bishop c5 has it Feels similar to the evans gambit where You give up this pawn on b4 after they Capture you can play c3 forcing their Bishop to come back and then play d4 Really controlling the center of the Board anytime you give up material you Want to have some compensation so Controlling the center of the board Is the way i like to go about it but After they take on b4 you have another Option and that is to start to go down This path of the lewis trap And it starts with the idea of Really controlling this f file similar To in the king’s gambit and that’s with Pawn to f4 this is when i first came Across this what intrigued me because Already this is how i like to play in The bishop’s opening if they play bishop C5 And the king’s game it is my favorite Opening of all time just very familiar With my bishop on c4 attacking this weak Square on f7 and then just lining up all My material on this f file and really
Putting a lot of pressure on my Opponent’s king Now they could take on f4 but they could Also play knight c6 many times when You’re putting something strange on your Opponent they may just develop more Material and say hey i know i need to Get more material involved into the game So i’m just going to play it safe played Knight c6 which i think is the most Common line Defending the square on e5 We are now going to continue to get more Material involved into the game with Knight f3 this does a few things one Adds another attacker on the e5 square It also prepares for our knight to come To g5 which now the knight and the Bishop are both eyeing down this f7 Square which is very weak for black Early on only the king is protecting it And it also opens up more importantly For our king to castle on the king side Anytime you play f4 in the king’s gambit Or in this particular line you usually Want to be castling king side to get Your rook on the f file to attack this F7 square and that’s exactly what we’re Going to be doing Here Now black has a few options and we’ll Look at you know if they play the pawn Takes on f4 Okay well now we can play go back to i
Would say plan b Playing a’s if they just continue with What we’re hoping for in this trap but Now okay they play their bishop back and Now we control the center of the board With d4 we can cast on the king’s side Still have a lot of the same Ideas in our mind that’s completely fine We’re going to get this pawn back on f4 Pretty easily with our bishop here And now we control the center of the Board and this f file is still for Us to attack but if they say you know What We’re not going to take instead we’re Going to play d6 again getting more Mature involved into the game if you Play against the king’s gambit A lot you’ll know that this d6 move is Very very common it opens up for the Light square bishop to get involved into The game so i think you’ll see this More times than not We are going to continue with our game Plan and that’s castle on the king side Now from here one option that black has Is to play bishop g4 if they don’t i Still like our setup this is exactly What we’re going for and we have a lot Of threats already but if they play Bishop g4 this is the trap that we have Laid for them because we can immediately Take on f7 and this just shows you How much of a threat that we have when
Our bishop’s on c4 and our opponent has Their pawn on e5 and e6 opening up for These light squares for us to take here On f7 because if they take Well now you can start to see we have Knight g5 this opens up this is a check On the king on f7 but it also opens up For a queen to take on G4 now the worst option they could do From here Is to go and take with their queen and Say Okay yeah uh you We’re just gonna take your knight if you Take our bishop we’re protecting that That’s fine but you can see because the Rook is on f1 we have the discovered Check with pawn takes here check and now They’re going to be forced to move their King and we can just gobble up their Bishop on g4 Don’t think they’re going to play the Worst move but just give you an idea of The threats that we have But even still okay now we know That they’re not going to take with Their queen maybe they move their king They come back to king to e8 Okay well now we can just take the Bishop on g4 and you can see their king Is going to be in a lot of danger can’t Castle on either side of the board it’s Going to be in the center and now we Have a lot of threats
Now if we come back you can see that e8 Is important because let’s say they just Come back to f8 i think this is a much Worse move because now we play queen Takes on g4 And the threat here is knight to e6 you Can see this is forking the queen and The king so that’s gonna be a tough spot So now they come to e8 but now we can Just play Knight to e6 this was still the threat Even in the other move when they had King on e8 initially we just bring our Knight to e6 attacking the queen Once the queen moves it doesn’t matter Even if it comes to e7 protecting the g7 Square we can still play knight takes g7 Attacking the king here and just picking Up an extra pawn remember we still have This rook on f1 This bishop on b4 when it came over here Took that pawn it’s really not doing Anything in the game at all Our king is pretty safe over here on g1 If the bishop ever came to c5 we could Just move it away so that’s not really a Threat that we have to worry about And we can just continue to add more Pressure on our opponent Now that was looking if they captured Our bishop on f7 let’s look back and see What happens if they don’t take our Bishop on f7 okay well really i think The only option would be
King f8 yes they could block their queen If they wanted to with King to e7 i think that’s probably Getting a little too cute but King to f8 makes some sense yes it is on The f-file but there’s a lot of pieces That would have to be removed before This rook could really threaten the king Here on f8 But from now It’s still attacking our bishop on f7 so We can just bring our bishop back to b3 This is a pretty common square that Bobby fischer used to play the bishop on B3 with this long light square diagonal Still open Always has to be worried about this Threat black does of the bishop just Attacking some of the critical squares That black has access to They could play bishop c5 attacking our King at any point but we could just play King h1 doesn’t really matter too much And now if they want to capture The pawn on f4 Then we can just play bishop b2 as soon As they play the pawn away from e5 we Can just strike with bishop b2 and now We have both of our bishops eyeing down On the king’s side they don’t have King side safety and so their king is Completely exposed we can get our queen Involved into the game we still have a Rook on the f5 i think this is very very
Good for us if they don’t take the pawn Maybe instead they played knight f6 Well now we can just take that pawn If they take the pawn well now we play Pawn to d3 solidify this pawn chain our King is safe on h1 we can get our dark Square bishop involved into the game we Can always bring it to b2 as well We can start to get our knight involved Into the game we still have this rook on This open file with both of these Knights only blocking the king here on F8 so i think all in all really depends On how black moves but we have a lot of Threats Doesn’t matter where they end up so this Is another one of those openings that i Really like because it follows a lot of The same principles that i like to play In chess already And it just allows my opponents to make A lot of mistakes so remember to come in Here we are going to castle and then Just see what our opponent’s doing if They try to come down and pin down our Knight to the queen we say not not so Fast my friend we’re just going to go And take up here on f7 so that is the Steines lowest trap hopefully enjoyed This video If you wouldn’t mind hitting that like Button let me know in the comment Section below below that you enjoyed it But thanks so much for watching i’ll see
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