7 Opening Traps That Win Before Move 10
Opening traps are not serious chess, but they win serious rating points. At the club level, the same patterns repeat thousands of times: a premature queen sortie, a missed pin, a poisoned pawn. Here are seven traps worth knowing, both to set them and to see them coming.
1. Scholar's Mate (and why it fails)
The most basic trap: 1.e4 e5 2.Qh5 (or 2.Bc4 Nc6 3.Qf3), threatening mate on f7. Against a total beginner who doesn't see 4.Qxf7#, it works. Against anyone who knows the defence, 2...Nc6 3.Bc4 g6!, the queen is misplaced, White has wasted two moves on the queen that should have been spent on development, and Black is better.
The lesson: Scholar's Mate teaches you to defend, not to attack. If your opponent plays it, punish the early queen by developing with tempo (attacking the queen while bringing out your pieces).
2. Legal's Trap
Named after Sire de Légal, this trap arises in the Italian or Philidor: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bc4 Bg4 4.Nc3 g6? (a natural but careless move) 5.Nxe5!, sacrificing the queen. If Black plays 5...Bxd1?? 6.Bxf7+ Ke7 7.Nd5#, it's checkmate. The queen sacrifice is a decoy: taking the queen removes the bishop from the defence of the critical squares.
The trap works because Black's 4...g6 weakens the light squares around the king. The correct response to 5.Nxe5 is 5...dxe5, just recapturing, but in the heat of a game, the hanging queen on d1 is irresistible.
3. The Lasker Trap (Queen's Gambit)
In the Albin Countergambit: 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e5!? 3.dxe5 d4 4.e3? (the natural-looking move that walks into the trap) 4...Bb4+ 5.Bd2 dxe3!, not recapturing the bishop but instead pushing the pawn. After 6.Bxb4?? exf2+ 7.Ke2 fxg1=N+!, an underpromotion to a knight with check, forking king and rook. It's one of the few positions where underpromotion is the only winning move.
White avoids the trap with 4.Nf3 instead of 4.e3. Knowing the Lasker Trap teaches you the Albin Countergambit and makes you a more dangerous 1.d4 player.
4. The Stafford Gambit
A dubious but dangerous gambit: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 Nc6! instead of the normal 3...d6. Black sacrifices a pawn for rapid development and attacking chances against an unprepared opponent. The main trap: 4.Nxc6 dxc6 5.d3? Bc5, and after 6.Bg5?? Nxe4! 7.Bxd8 Bxf2+ 8.Ke2 Bg4#.
See its opening page. The Stafford is objectively bad, engines refute it easily, but it wins constantly in blitz and rapid because the traps are hard to see over the board. The antidote: 4.Nf3! (retreating the knight) is the simplest refutation.
5. The Fried Liver Attack
The most brutal Italian Game trap: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5!, threatening Nxf7, forking queen and rook. After 4...d5 5.exd5 Nxd5?! 6.Nxf7! (the Fried Liver), White sacrifices the knight for a devastating attack: 6...Kxf7 7.Qf3+ Ke6 8.Nc3, and the Black king is dragged to the centre of the board.
The correct defence is 5...Na5! (the Traxler or the modern 5...Na5 line), side-stepping the sacrifice. Explore the full Fried Liver Attack opening page.
6. The Englund Gambit Trap
Against 1.d4: 1.d4 e5?! 2.dxe5 Nc6 3.Nf3 Qe7 4.Bf4?? Qb4+!, winning the bishop on f4, because the queen forks the bishop and the b2 pawn (which hangs with check on c3 after ...Qxb2). White avoids this with 4.e3 or 4.Nc3 instead of 4.Bf4. See the Englund Gambit opening page.
7. The Blackburne Shilling Gambit
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nd4!?, a sneaky knight move that sets a trap. If White plays the obvious 4.Nxe5?? Qg5!, forking the knight on e5 and the pawn on g2. After 5.Nxf7 Qxg2 6.Rf1 Qxe4+ 7.Be2 Nf3#, a smothered-style mate.
The refutation is simple: 4.Nxd4! exd4, and White is fine, the knight was en prise. See the Italian Game opening page.
Try it yourself
Test these traps in games against the computer at a lower difficulty, then try them in rated games. More importantly, learn to see traps coming. Solve tactical puzzles daily to train your pattern recognition, the same motifs (forks, pins, deflections) appear in every trap on this list.