This image doesn’t directly relate to the game I will show but it does present its fair share of nostalgia. My years ago I would create these knight tour puzzles for my students (beginners) where the goal would be to capture the king without landing on a pawn. Not too tough but I would also require them to visualize the tour before the executed their plan (little tougher).
Anyways, there is a common knight tour in the most popular of openings 1.e4. I prefer to play the Italian Game (1.e4 e5 2. NF3 Nc6 3. Bc4!) because there are some tricky lines that tend to be extremely effective against beginners. The tricky lines are a good way to build confidence for my developing students but there comes a point, there came a point, when my students become tired of tricks are more interested in Mr. Reliable.
This is when I teach them the slow positional approach to playing the Italian.
I really appreciated this attacking scheme because it takes some time to develop. The attack gets dangerous when white can efficiently get his knight to the f5- outpost. The issue is the c8- bishop patrolling the square. The manuever white must be aware of is Nb1-d2-f1-g3. If white is allowed to outpost the knight, the position gets tough for black since the queen will soon make its appearance.
8. Nbd2 0-0 9. Nf1 d5 10. Qe2 dxe4 11. dxe4 Qe7 12. Ng3 h6 13. Nh4! Kh7 14. Nhf5 Qe8
Now the queen gets involved by way of Qf3-g3. The moment the queen lands on the f3 square tactics can get crazy. The idea of coming to g3 is simply to put another attacker on the g-pawn and hopefully deliver checkmate.
15. Qf3 Ng8
After the knight retreats white follows with the devastating!
16. Nxg7!