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White to Play

Pete Tamburro on

Published in Chess Puzzles

A quickie—between giants, no less! The game Kamsky-Anand in 1994 went like this: 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 c5 3.c3 g6 4.Bg5 Qb6 5.Qb3 Ne4 6.Bf4 Nc6 7.d5 Nd8 8.Nbd2 Nf6 9.e4 d6 10.Bb5+ Bd7 11.a4 Qc7 12.0–0 Bg7 13.e5 Nh5 14.exd6 exd6 15.Rfe1+ Kf8 16.Bxd7 Qxd7 and now, in this diagrammed position, Kamsky played one move and Anand resigned. What was the move?


Solution:

This is a great lesson, even for grandmasters, as to why you should not leave castling for later. Kamsky sees that the queen is defending two key squares—d6 and e8—and makes a “decoy” move of 1.Qb5, whereupon Black has to resign. The queen can’t leave its protection of d6 because an immediate 2.Bxd6+ followed by 3.Re8 mate happens. If he retreats with 1…Nhf6 then 2.Qxd7 Nxd7 3.Bxd6+ Kg8 4.Re8+ Nf8 5.Bxc5 with not only material gain, but a dominating position.

 


Send questions and comments to PTamburro@aol.com.

 

 

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