Talk about having him right where you want him! White announced a mate here in 7 and Black resigned. There's actually a mate in 6. See if you can find either one.

Solution:

The game is worth playing over, especially for beginners, because of a fairly frequently seen queen sacrifice seen in beginner games that we have shown here before. If you do take out your set and play it over, stop after move 8 by Black and see if you can work out the queen sacrifice. White knew that, even though he could not see the mate when he sacrificed the queen, he could mate the king if he could force it up the board toward his own pieces. That kind of intuitive judgment is important in chess.

Perrier-Wellmuth, 1917: 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 3.Nc3 Nxd5 4.Bc4 Nb6 [4...Nxc3 5.Qf3 , threatening Bxf7+ and the knight: 5...Na4 6.Bxf7+ Kd7 7.Qd5#] 5.Bb3 Nc6 6.Nf3 e5 7.d3 Bg4 8.h3 Bh5 9.Nxe5 Bxd1 10.Bxf7+ Ke7 11.Bg5+ Kd6 12.Ne4+ Kxe5 13.f4+ Kd4 14.Rxd1 Ke3 [Black would still lose with14...Qxg5 15.c3+ Ke3 16.0–0 Nd4 17.fxg5 Rd8 18.Rf2 Rd5 19.Re1+ Kxd3 20.Bxd5 Nxd5 21.Rd2+ Kc4 22.Rxd4+ Kb5 23.Rxd5+] 15.0–0 Nd4

And now our solution..the announced mate in 7 in bold and the mate in 6 in parentheses:

16.Rde1+ [16.Rfe1+ Ne2+ 17.Rxe2+ Kxe2 18.Nc3+ Ke3 19.d4 Qxg5 (19...Qxd4 20.f5+ Qf4 21.Rd3#) 20.Rd3+ Kxf4 21.Rf3#] 16...Ne2+ 17.Rxe2+ Kxe2 18.Bh5+ Ke3 19.Rf3+ Kd4 20.Bf7 Nd5 21.c3+ Nxc3 22.bxc3#

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