Nice instructive chess video, you deserve more views

My Italian opening looks very much like that, including c3 to stop the knight jumping in and h3 to discourage pinning the f3 knight, but that's where the resemblance ends... I hate the forced white bishop trade for all the reasons you mentioned, so in Game #1 black taking with the rook was the mistake that allowed white to outpost the knight on that fantastic square f5. In Game #2 before resigning, as black I would at least have tried qa2 attacking the rook? Thank you for opening my eyes to all the potential of what can often be a very cramped game.