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Later Kibitzing> |
| Jan-29-18 | | Strelets: It's Monday, so let's sac the... pawn? 35.h4+ and Black's king is forced onto a square it will never leave. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | jffun1958: 35.h4+ drops the curtain. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | agb2002: White has the queen and a bishop for two rooks. White delivers mate in two with 35.h4+ Kxh4 36.Qh6#. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | patzer2: Black's decisive mistake according to the computer was 22...c4? allowing 23. Nc6 +- (+3.20 @ 26 ply, Stockfish 8). Instead, 22...Qe8 23. Qd2 ± puts up more resistance. Black's game takes a turn for the worse with the overly simplifying 15...Nd7?!, allowing White a permanent edge after 16. Bxg2 ⩲ to ±. Instead, 14...a5 = (0.00 @ 30 ply, Stockfish 8) keeps the tension and gives Black enough maneuvering room to probably hold the draw. Early in the opening, I prefer the more popular move 7...c6 as in the draws in the strong GM games E Romanov vs V Fedoseev, 2017 and M Yilmaz vs I Nepomniachtchi, 2017. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | Geronimo: Not only a fun Monday, but a beautiful game. Ivanchuk delivers a masterclass in positioning and using his knight against black’s pawns, then exploits his opponent’s weakened defenses to force a Q v. RR endgame and an elegant finish. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | saturn2: 35 h4 Kxh4 36 Qh6÷÷ |
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| Jan-29-18 | | leRevenant: One out of one so far this week and I'm flying ! |
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| Jan-29-18 | | AlicesKnight: It's mate in 2 with h4+ and Qh6. What if 33....Rg7? |
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| Jan-29-18 | | Once: You have to feel a little sorry for Black in this game. This is (arguably) the crunch position, with Black to play:
click for larger viewBlack is struggling. His queenside is badly congested and Chuckie has a nasty outposted knight on c6. What's worse is that the Black queen might find herself trapped and stabbed to death by minor pieces. Then Black spots an audacious plan. He is going to sacrifice his queen (temporarily) and win material. His thinking goes something like this: 24...Nxa4 25. bxa4 Qxb1!
click for larger viewThis is the "happy" position that Black had in mind. Now 26. Rxb1 Rxb1+ 27. Bf1 Bh3! 
click for larger viewBlack is winning. White can defend against the mate threat with 28. Qxc4, but then Black exchanges down to an material plus with something like 28... Rxf1 29. Qxf1 Bxf1 30. Kxf1 
click for larger viewBlack is the exchange up and ought to win. His rook will be far faster than the white knight at sweeping up loose pawns. That's what Black hoped would happen. Instead, rewind to the position after 25...Qxb1
click for larger viewWhite has one move and one move only to save himself. 26. Nxe7! Kf7 27. Nxc8 
click for larger viewNow Black's back rank trick doesn't work because he has no bishop to jump into h3. He has to retreat his queen and suffer a grisly endgame, say with 28...Qb4 29. Qxb4 Rxb4 30. Nxd6 In the game Black has a rush of blood to the head and plays the unnecessary queen sac with 28. Qxe1+ I wonder ... did Chuckie see all this before allowing 24...Na4? |
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| Jan-29-18 | | areknames: Somehow i missed 36.Qh6# and went for Qf6+ which works anyway after Kh3 (g5 is followed by Qh6# which I got in this sequence!) 37.g5+ Kh4 38.Qxf4+ Kh5 39.Qg4# Seemed a bit too hard for a Monday.. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | morfishine: <35.h4+> followed by mate |
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| Jan-29-18 | | paavoh: <...did Chuckie see all this before allowing 24...Na4?> You bet. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | Mayankk: You try the first 10 secs to sac Queen from n different angles, knowing it’s a Monday. No luck and you wonder if it’s a complex puzzle. Then you spot the h4 check and have a nice chuckle to yourself! |
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Jan-29-18
 | | OhioChessFan: Oh, come on, <Mayankk>, how hard can a Monday be? I doubt anyone else did the same thing as you, cough, cough. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | Mayankk: Haha. I actually tried to sac my poor Queen on f5, f6 and even h6. Weirdly it didn’t work and I was like, man, just when I thought my chess is getting better... Thankfully the only other check was h4 and the puzzle solved itself once I spotted it. They say that masters do not look much further than the rest of us patzers. They just do not waste time on stupid lines. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | whiteshark: I have nothing to add what <FSR> said, and that's it. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | whiteshark: Btw what exactly is the <Semi-Leningrad Variation>????? |
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| Jan-29-18 | | saturn2: Could not have white also played 23 bxc4? |
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| Jan-29-18 | | get Reti: This is more like "do the move that looks best" than "do the surprising move that still ends up winning". Nothing wrong with that... Just saying |
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| Jan-29-18 | | zb2cr: No Queen sacrifice on this Monday! Instead, a Pawn sacrifice for a mate in 2: 35. h4+, Kxh4; 36. Qh6#. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | cocker: The puzzle could have started a move earlier. |
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Jan-29-18
 | | Bubo bubo: 35.h4+ lures the black king into the trap: 35...Kxh4 36.Qh6#. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | Pasker: Not that easy to miss this puzzle. |
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| Jan-29-18 | | stst: h4, that's it.
Surely if KxP, Qh6+, no more escape sq.
Might be the easiest of all time!! |
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| Jan-29-18 | | stst: <Chucky's the best..> For some "chucky" reason, Chucky couldn't rise to the top?
But still quite a top entertainer!! |
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Kibitzing
sac: 25.bxa4