Saturday, February 15, 2025

 

When Everything is in Place





As active chess players, we appreciate a well-executed kingside attack. If we are on the receiving side, not so much. A sense of dread and collapse overcomes us. Much theory has been written on the topic, and they always include the proverbial bishop sacrifice on the rook pawn. After a series of losses, I finally got my act together. In this case, a pin on the black queen proved decisive. 

 The attack started with 20.Ne4. The black queen lacked safe squares to go except for e7 and d8. After 20...Qe7, white's F pawn crashed into black's castled position with 21.f6! Qd8  22.fg Ng7 23.Nf6+ Kh8  24.Qh4 threatening mate at h6. Black resigned here.

Black still has 24...Nf5 defending the h6 pawn and attacking the white queen, but the knight is undefended and can be captured by the rook on f1. So, 24...h5 seems to hold the position. But, white sneaks in with 25. Qg5.


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