English Defense: Poli Gambit

1. d4 e6 2. c4 b6 3. e4 Bb7 4. f3 f5 5. exf5 Nh6

The English Defense: Poli Gambit is a chess opening classified as ECO A40, reached after 1. d4 e6 2. c4 b6 3. e4 Bb7 4. f3 f5 5. exf5 Nh6. It is a line of the English Defense. White is to move.

This exact move order didn't appear in our sample of 12.6 million Lichess games: it's a rare line.

Engine evaluation: +0.02 (Stockfish, depth 32; best line 6. fxe6 Nf5 7. Bf4 dxe6 8. Nc3 Nxd4)

ECO: A40
Moves: 10 plies
FEN: rn1qkb1r/pbpp2pp/1p2p2n/5P2/2PP4/5P2/PP4PP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 1 6
PGN: 1. d4 e6 2. c4 b6 3. e4 Bb7 4. f3 f5 5. exf5 Nh6

Analyse with Stockfish · Board image (SVG) · Open on Lichess

Master games

11 over-the-board games are classified under this line (White 9%, draw 18%, Black 73%). The strongest:

GM Bernal Gonzalez Acosta (2476) – GM Aleksandr Lenderman (2614) 0-1 · 11th American Continental · 2016-05-29
IM Bernardo Roselli Mailhe (2433) – GM Emilio Cordova (2621) 0-1 · 13th American Continental · 2018-06-05
IM Luis Carlos Torres Rosas (2352) – GM Emilio Cordova (2581) 0-1 · CCCSA Summer GMA 2021 · 2021-08-01
IM Jony Wilson Leon Valdes (2392) – GM Emilio Cordova (2534) 0-1 · 8th ch-Iberoamericano · 2022-02-14
IM Alejandro Franco Alonso (2427) – GM David Larino Nieto (2484) 1/2-1/2 · 9th Bilbao Open 2016 · 2016-07-21

Search all games of the English Defense: Poli Gambit and its sub-variations

Comes from

English Defense (2. c4 b6) 1. d4 e6 2. c4 b6

More English Defense lines (all)

Opening names and moves from the Lichess openings dataset; statistics from the Lichess open database, 2026-09 (CC0), sample of 12.6 million games, bots excluded; evaluations from Lichess cloud analysis (all CC0). Master games from The Week in Chess #920–#1664 by Mark Crowther, used with permission.