Novelty Piece Sac against the Jobava London!

I used to hate facing the Jobava London almost as much as the regular London. But after discovering this Super cool Novelty, that changed.

I stumbled across this line while playing around with the opening explorer and the engine, as i tend to do.

It starts with 3... a6, a very useful move for preventing any sort of Nb5 shenanigans which otherwise often occur in the Jobava London. But it's certainly not only a passive move since it also prepares b5, making queenside castles a bad idea in the future for white.
The clearly most played response and the only one we'll look at is 4.e3 which we will meet with the rare move c5!

After c5 comes our first crossing in the road: White can either

1. capture the c5 and hold on to it
2. capture and let us recapture
3. or simply not take the c pawn.

There will be a section for each approach.

The greedy approach of trying to win the pawn is the best according to good ol' trusty stockfish and also the most played move by humans. Luckily, it happens to also be the one which we like to see the most as it guarantees some fun.

The greedy approach/Main line

After 4... e6 white correctly tries to hold on to the c5 pawn with Na4, and Nbd7 further provokes b4, solidifying the pawn chain. But now is our time to strike with the aggressive b6!
The opponent is left with two options:

1. cxb6, giving us a pleasant position down a pawn with the initiative in our hands. Objectively equal but if anyone enjoys a small edge it's us.
2. c6, the best and most popular move, allowing us to unleash an out of the blue piece sacrifice

Accepting the pawn gambit with cxb6

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We enter this sort of semi-forced line after Nxb6 in which they should play c3 and after Nxa4 Qxa4 Bd7 they should play Qb3 to stay in the game. Our plan in the resulting position is simple: Busting open the Queenside with a5 while making as many threats as we can, and it is up to white to defend

Piece sacrifice after c6

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Lets get to the meat of it!

8.c6 seems to put a spanner in our works, but don't be afraid, we've got something up our sleeves...

8... Bxb4 is a brilliant sacrifice that will only start to reveal its point in the next couple of moves: 9.c3 Ba5 10.cxd7 Bxd7 and the starting position is reached.

In other blog post there would now often be one or two long lines which are commented, but i think for this sacrifice understanding the general ideas is actually more helpful. That is why I chose to explain it that way -- if you don't like that, please let me know

There are a variety of playable moves for white here, but regardless which one is played, there are certain ideas to play for as black. They all focus on increasing the pressure on c3 to a maximum, eclipsing in taking on c3 or winning a piece back. The plans to do that consist of:

• Qe7 - very important move, intending Qa3 as well as e5 sometimes. Qe7 should be played as a response to basically every move on move 11.
• Ne4 - Also a key move, putting pressure on c3 and making space for f6 + e5 and opening the diagonal for the Lady
• b5 - kicking the Knight (most often goes to b2) to decrease amount of defenders of c3. also occasionally, b4 is good to chip at c3
• Rc8 - sort of a no-brainer, once again attacking c3. (I hope your starting to see a pattern) Rxc3 is most often also better thatn Bxc3 since that Bishop is our best piece
• e5 + d4 - supported by Qe7 this can wreak havoc on an uncastled king in the center

As i said there are many responses to this line and i covered all of the important ones in the study. The Main ones are Be5 and Nd2, both are roughly equally good and equally popular.

They dont take on c5

At first I thought that there was no new and interesting idea to play for here, but with some help of the engine I was able to come up with an interesting concept which is totally sound and sets up a little trap.
The Plan is as follows:

• delay any moves on the Queenside until Ne5 is on the board
• meet Ne5 with Nfd7! so that the b8 Knight can still access c6
• Nxe5 Bxe5 and Nc6, forcing the Bishop to move to either g3 or f4
• if it goes to f4: g5 followed by f5 and f4 is very strong
• if it goes to g3: cxd4 followed by Bf6 and Qb6 wins a pawn

It looks like this in practice

This is just the line that occurs white makes all the most popular moves\* and of course many times variations will happen but this unique plan can always be applied in these lines. If white captures on c5 though, we got different positions which lie beyond the scope of this Blog. After all, this is just the repertoire I developed by myself primarily for fun, and I don't claim to guarantee completeness.

\* Games on Lichess, 2000 rated or higher, Blitz or slower

They let us recapture

This usually indicates that we have to be prepared to meet e4 in the next couple of moves. Althoug e4 in itself is not scary, it makes sense to put our pieces most optimally to meet e4.

One of the best setups to do this is as follows:

• Nbd7 - is always superior to Nc6
• b5 - multipurpose move, gaining space, threatening b4, developing the Sniper
• Bb7 - Here our B has the most scope, aiming directly at e4
• O-O can often be delayed in order to prioritise piece development

Final words

I really hope you enjoyed this post, it is my first one and it took quite a few hours to make. If you have any feedback, please don't hesitate to say it so that in the future I can improve my blogs. I got many cool and interesting opening surprises in my bag so you wouldn't want me to write bad blogs about them :)

anyway, have a good day