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| Aug-16-14 | | Lighthorse: Yeah, I saw the obvious Bxh7 also, and then obsessed with that black Bishop on a3 keeping me from blocking off the King's escape to e7. It never dawned on me to go the other way with f5. But that white Rook lift to f3 really fooled me as I played through the game. I never saw that either. It seemed like a total tempo waste. But now I see it becomes useful on g3 many many moves later. |
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| Aug-16-14 | | Once: A slightly odd puzzle, methinks. The Greek gift sacrifice is pretty obvious. Then white has a fair few choices about how to proceed. Fritzie finds plenty of alternative moves and transpositions. Even Shirov's main plain of f5 and e6 doesn't seem obligatory, or necessarily the strongest moves. It's all a bit meh. Nice attack. Fun to play through, but not really a puzzle. |
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| Aug-16-14 | | kevin86: I had the bishop sac- after that, it's everyone on their own! |
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| Aug-16-14 | | vajeer: How about 30...Bb2. It protects the g7 pawn. And if Rxb2, White cannot play Rc7 later which is a key move for White. |
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Aug-16-14
 | | Jimfromprovidence: This is no run of the mill Greek gift game.
Two moves come to mind. The first is 25 Rf3!, below. (Most would just play 25 Qh7+). 
click for larger viewThere is a beautiful threat here, Rh3, seeing ...Kf8 Nh7+ Kg8 Nf6+, winning black's queen. This forces the response 25...Ne7. I also appreciated the subtle 30 Rg3.
click for larger view The threat is 31 Nh7+ Ke7 32 Rg7+. |
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| Aug-16-14 | | SpiritedReposte: <Reindeer Games> |
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| Aug-16-14 | | WDenayer: This was incredibly easy. I do not want to sound arrogant - there have been Thursdays and Fridays that I did not solve. But this one: in a real game I would play 22.Bxh7 immediately. Of course it cannot be all worked out. It is not necessary. 22. Bxh7 wins, it's just something you know. The rest makes perfect sense. 35.Rc7 is a nice move, but very easy to find, just a basic tactic. This was the easiest Saturday since I am on this site. |
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| Aug-16-14 | | agb2002: The material is identical.
Black threatens ... Rxb3.
White seems to be ready for a greek gift, 22.Bxh7+:
A) 22... Kxh7 23.Ng5+
A.1) 23... Kg6 24.Qh4 Nxe5 (24... Rh8 25.Qxh8; 24... Kf5 25.Qh3+ Kg6 26.Qh7#) 25.fxe5 and mate in two. A.2) 23... Kh6(8) 24.Qh4+ and 25.Qh7#.
A.3) 23... Kg8 24.Qh4
A.3.a) 24... Rd8 25.Rf3
A.3.a.i) 25... f5(6) 26.Qh7+ Kf8 27.Qh8+ Ke7 28.Qxg7+ Ke8 29.Qg8+ Bf8 (29... Ke7 30.Qf7#) 30.Qg6+ Qf7 31.Qxf7#. A.3.a.ii) 25... Kf8 26.Qh8+ Ke7 27.Qxg7 Rf8 (27... Qe8 28.Rxc6 + -) 28.Nh7 Bb7 (28... Re8 29.Qf6#; 28... Rd8 29.Qf6+ Ke8 30.Rg3 followed by Rg8 + -) 29.f5 and the threat 30.Bg5+ seems to win material. A.3.a.iii) 25... Rxb3 26.Rh3 Kf8 27.Qh8+ Ke7 28.Qxg7 Rf8 29.Nh7 Rd8 (29... Qd8 30.Rxc6) 30.Qg5+ seems to win (30... Ke8 31.Nf6+; 30... f6 31.Qg7+ Ke8 32.Nxf6#). A.3.b) 24... Re8 25.Rf3 looks similar to previous lines. B) 22... Kh8 23.Qh4 looks winning. For example, 23... Rd8 24.Bg6+ Kg8 25.Qh7+ Kf8 26.Qh8+ Ke7 27.Qxg7 Rf8 28.Ng5 wins material. |
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Aug-16-14
| | Jimfromprovidence: This is what Nunn says about this game.(After 22 Bxh7 concerning the Greek gift concept). "Here however, it is far less clear cut. Black is immediately mated if he plays ....Kg6, but the ...Kg8 defense proves a tough nut to crack". "White is able to win, but he must display considerable creativity to do so". As to 25 Rf3 he says; "White finds an original concept that you won't find in any textbook of attacking play". I strongly agree with his assessment. |
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| Aug-16-14 | | Marmot PFL: It seems 22 Bxh7+ is strong, but to calculate all the lines of attack and defense is extremely hard. Up to move 24 it's all forced and I saw 25 Rf3, which stops 25...Kf8 due to 26 Nh7+ Kg8 27 Rg3 and Nf6+. Now 26 Rh3 is threatened so 26...Ne7 27 Qh7+ Kf8 28 Qh8+ Ng8 29 Nh7+ Ke7 30 Qxg7 is typical, with 2 pawns and an attack for the piece (Ng5 and/or f5 are threatened). |
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| Aug-16-14 | | Once: <Jim> Maybe, maybe. Far be it for me to quibble with you or the mighty Nunn, but... Playing a rook to the third or fourth rank so that it can swing across in front of the pawns isn't exactly a new concept. I'm not even sure if it is the only way to win or the best move in the position. After four hours on infinite analysis, Fritzie marginally prefers 25. Qh5 to 25. Rf3, although the difference is tiny (+4.39 to +4.34). Fritzie also finds five other moves which give white an advantage of +2 or better - Rfc1, Bf2, b4, Ra1 and Qh7+ 25. Rf3 is a nice move, but we may be in danger of writing history to favour the victor. 30. Rg3 does appear to be the only way to win at that point in the game. But between moves 26 and 29, Fritz is currently saying that Shirov played less than optimal moves which allowed his advantage to slip back. I'm letting him chew on the position after 25...Ne7.
Don't get me wrong - it's a strong attack. I couldn't have played it OTB. But Dr Nunn's enthusiasm isn't currently being matched by Herr Fritz's. |
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Aug-16-14
| | Jimfromprovidence: <Once> I like the move 25 Rf3 for a couple of reasons. It's a novel move, and prevents black from playing say 25...Rxb3. The consequences of the move 25...Rxb3 lead to the cool combination 26 Rh3 Kf8 27 Nh7+ Kg8 28 Nf6+. 
click for larger view |
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| Aug-16-14 | | jimx: For such an "easy" Saturday puzzle, everyone (including Shirov) seems to have missed 34.Nf6! Crafty has a forced mate in 9 moves with either 34..e5 or 34..Nxf6 in response: 34. Nf6 e5 35. Qh7+ Ke6 36. Nxd7 Bb7 37. Nxb8 Be7 38. Qxg6+ Nf6 39. Bxf6 Bc5+ 40. Rxc5 Kd6 41. Be7+ Kxe7 42. Rc7+ Kd8 43. Qd6# 34. Nf6 Nxf6 35. Qxf6+ Kg8 36. Bh6 Bb2 37. Rxb2 Qa7+ 38. Rf2 Rb7 39. Rxg6+ Kh7 40. Bf8 Qxf2+ 41. Kxf2 Rxf8 42. Rh6+ Kg8 43. Rh8# |
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May-07-17
 | | saffuna: Shirov in FOB2 on 22 Bxh7+; "A simple, known, but still a nice, sacrifice." Then he writes of 32. Bh6: "I saw this move when playing 22. Bxh7+. And you, my German friend?" |
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May-07-17
 | | perfidious: <saffuna....Then (Shirov) writes of 32. Bh6: "I saw this move when playing 22. Bxh7+. And you, my German friend?"> Far as I know, Reinderman is Dutch. |
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May-07-17
| | saffuna: I think Shirov is referring to Fritz, which he is using to analyze and found him out with a couple of second-best moves during this sequence. |
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| Feb-02-25 | | shishio71: Ooh, a Shirov Sunday! |
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| Feb-02-25 | | mel gibson: I saw that straight away.
It's more a Wednesday puzzle.
Stockfish 17 says:
22. Bxh7+
(22. Bxh7+ (1.Bxh7+ Kxh7 2.Ng5+ Kg8 3.Qh4 Re8 4.Rf3
Ne7 5.Qh7+ Kf8 6.Qh8+ Ng8 7.Bf2 f6 8.exf6 gxf6 9.Nh7+ Ke7 10.Rg3 Qd6
11.Rg7+ Kd8 12.Rxg8 Bd7 13.Qxf6+ Qe7 14.Rg7 Qxf6 ) +7.49/44
317)
score for White +7.49 depth 44. |
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Feb-02-25
 | | Teyss: Hi mel gibson,
No offence but seeing the first move doesn't make it a solve. Bxh7+ is a standard sac but how to continue afterwards? There are plenty of Bxh7+ or Bxh2+ which eventually fail because the position was not ripe for it or the attacking side missed something. This is a real Sunday puzzle (also Saturday back in 2014) considering it took the great Shirov more than 20 extra moves to win, Nunn's comments above and the fact even Shirov missed best continuations as per SF: 28.Bf2 and 34.Nf6. (<perfidious>, no need to add fire on post.) Beautiful sequence nonetheless. The slow Rook lift 25.Rf3! is valiant. 28.f5 followed by e6, although suboptimal, is creative. The deflection sac 35.Rc7!! seems obvious afterwards but is hard to spot OTB and even OffTB. |
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Feb-02-25
 | | scormus: <Teyss> yes a great puzzle.
I particularly like 25.Rf3!, the first move needing a decision while trying to solve. All my instincts were to dash in with the suboptimal 25 Qh7+?! which would have set off a chain of enticing threats and checks, picking up pawns on the way but allowing the BK to escape to c7 and relative safety. Would probably be my choice OTB but I wasn't sure OffTB. W would still have some advantage but nowhere near the winning line. I wasn't sure on move 28 either. The text looked logical, and I'm sceptical about the SF-based call. According to SF, the difference in eval between 28 f5 and Bf2 is not so much, while f5 would force B to go into damage limitation mode with the giving up of material. |
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| Feb-02-25 | | buckmeister: It�s a variant of the �Greek Gift� which requires h7 only defended by the K. After Bxh7, followed by knight check, which usually makes way for the Q to infiltrate on h5 (this time h4). Nice work by Shirov. |
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Feb-02-25
 | | chrisowen: I gack its jib mace its pawns its x quit fury its oh its lad v its z Bxh7+ ago its qo its aoh its jah its a fig pug boi time its Bxh7+ its eg x |
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Feb-02-25
| | chrisowen: Pig not pug x no? |
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| Feb-02-25 | | jimx: According to the comment I left over 10 years ago, it looks like this "easy" Saturday puzzle from 2014 has been promoted to an even easier (relatively speaking) Sunday puzzle in 2025. |
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| Feb-02-25 | | King.Arthur.Brazil: The following moves are previsible: 22. Bxh7+ Kxh7 23. Qh4+ Kg8 24. Ng5 Rd8 25. Qh7+ Kf8... now must come the insane part... which I didn't find... LOL Maybe, 25. f5 exf5 26. Rcf2 g6 27. Rxf5 gxf5 28. Rxf5 Rb7 29. Qh7+ Kf8 30. Qh8+ Ke7 31. Qf6+ Ke8 32. e6... |
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sac: 22.Bxh7+
