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Josef Augustin vs John Nunn
"The Flying Nunn" (game of the day Mar-05-2005)
European Team Championship (1977), Moscow URS, rd 4, Apr-??
Formation: King's Indian Attack (A07)  ·  0-1

8
7
6
5
4
3
2
a
1
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
White to move.
ANALYSIS [x]
0-1

rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1
FEN COPIED

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Kibitzer's Corner
Mar-05-05  FischerFan8897: very good game by Nunn
Mar-05-05
Premium Chessgames Member
  An Englishman: Good Evening: What intrigues me is how calmly Nunn finishes his development *after* the Queen sac. Notice how White has to start giving material back simply because Black is bringing out his pieces.
Mar-05-05  kevin86: This one starts with a queen sac for two pieces;black then continues to attack. White had to give up the exchange-twice. Even that didn't help.Black ended up far AHEAD in material.
Mar-05-05  MatrixManNe0: <Uncomplicated intuitive decisions are often distinguished by our opponent's lack of active play, and for the most part we should see only our own initiative developing.>

Augustin - Nunn

12... Nxd5! 13. Bxd8 Nf4 14. Bg5 Ngh5 15. Nxf4 Nxf4 16. Kh1 Be6!

<Piece development is the priority; in particular the a8-rook needs to be brought into play. The materialistic 16... Nxg2? allows White to turn the game in his favour by 17. Kxg2 Bh3+ 18. Kh1 Bxf1 19. Qxf1 0-0-0 20. Qe2 and 21. Rg1.>

17. Bf3 Rh4!

<Preventing Bg4 and vacating h8 for the other rook.>

18. Rg1 Ke7 19. Rg2!?

<How else can White defend against ... Rah8?>

19... Nxg2 20. Bxg2 Rah8 21. Qd2 Rxh2+ 22. Kg1 R2h4!

<Planning an attack along the g-file.>

23. Re1

<23. Bf3 is met by 23... Rg8+ 24. Kf1 Rf4! 25. Ke2 Bg4! 26. Bxg4 Rxf2+, reaching a won ending.>

Beliavsky, Alexander and Mikhalchishin, Adrian. Secrets of Chess Intuition. Great Britain: Cromwell, 2002. p. 26.

Mar-05-05  mymt: 6...h5 must remember this idea against a slow fianchetto K-side,no Nf3 to stop the pawn push opening the h file if 7.h4 g5 8.hxg5 Ng4 9.d3 h4 maybe.Great game.
Mar-05-05  THE pawn: Wasn't there any move made by Nunn to block the queen at the end of the game or did white made a mistake somewhere and put himself his queen there?
Mar-05-05  Ezzy: Wow!! Sacrificing your queen on move 13 for a win 20 moves later, must take incredible insight. Nunn must of had his Kasparov head on, for this game.
Mar-05-05  MatrixManNe0: <Ezzy> I hope you're not implying that Nunn had calculated the game twenty moves ahead. Simple intuition (okay, well not so simple intuition but intuition all the same) would have found this move in maybe ten minutes.
Mar-05-05  khense: Why 32 F3? Why not Q X B6 trying for perpetual or at least take out some black pawns?
Mar-10-07
Premium Chessgames Member
  tpstar: 1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. g3 <The Vienna Game often continues 3. f4 d5; here White chooses a quieter Kingside fianchetto.> Bc5 <3 ... Nc6 4. Bg2 Bb4 Zsuzsa Polgar vs C A Foisor, 1988 ; 3 ... d5 4. exd5 Nxd5 Spassky vs Karpov, 1979 > 4. Bg2 d6 5. Nge2 Nc6 6. 0-0 h5 <A bold attacking plan which breaks the rules but succeeds Opening Explorer > 7. d3 < M Krajnak vs O Hudoba, 2000 continued 7. Nd5 h4 8. b4!? Nxb4 9. Nxb4 Bxb4 10. c3 Ba5 and Black won> h4 8. Bg5 hxg3 9. Nxg3 <In D Eberly vs W Muir, 1984 White recaptured 9. hxg3 keeping control over f4> Nd4 10. Nh5 Ne6 <Not 10 ... Rxh5?! 11. Bxf6 Qxf6 12. Qxh5> 11. Nxg7+ <So White wins a Pawn ...> Nxg7 12. Nd5 <So White wins the piece back ...> Nxd5! <A tremendous Queen sacrifice leading to a well coordinated Kingside attack. Much worse is 12 ... Ngh5?! 13. Nxf6+ Nxf6 14. Qf3.> 13. Bxd8 Nf4 <[last book move]<>> 14. Bg5 Nge6 <Black reinforces the strong Nf4> 15. Bxf4 Nxf4 16. Kh1 <The King moves out of the Bc5/Pf2 pin but into the Rh8/Ph2 attack> Be6 17. Bf3 <[17. c3!? ]<>> Rh4 18. Rg1 <[18. d4 Bxd4 19. c3 =]<>> Ke7 <Black keeps the King in the closed center over 18 ... 0-0-0 where White might develop Queenside counterplay with a Pawn storm> 19. Rg2 Nxg2 20. Bxg2 Rah8 <Black cashes in the powerful Nf4 to win the Ph2> 21. Qd2 Rxh2+ 22. Kg1 R2h4 <Black makes excellent use of the weak f4 & h4 squares> 23. Re1? <[23. Qg5+ f6 24. Qg7+ Bf7 25. d4 Bxd4 26. a4 ]<>> Rg8 24. Re3 Bxe3 <Another way to win the exchange is 24 ... Bh3 25. Rxh3 Rxh3 and Black might still win the Bg2> 25. Qxe3 <25. fxe3 Bh3 anyway> Bh3 26. Kf1 Bxg2+ <Now Black has RRB vs Q for a won endgame> 27. Ke2 c5 28. Qd2 b6 <Black consolidates the Queenside> 29. Qc3 Rgg4 <[29 ... Bh3 ]<>> 30. Qa3 a5 31. Qb3 Bh3 32. f3 <[32. Qxb6 desperation Rg2 33. Kf1 Rg3+ 34. Ke1 Rg1+ 35. Ke2 Bg4+ 36. Kd2 ]<>> Rg2+ 33. Ke3 Bg4 0-1 <Black mates after 34 ... Bxf3! 35. Kxf3 Rhg4 confining the King>

<[Fritz 7]<>>

Jun-24-07  PAWNTOEFOUR: nice game by one of my favorite players........it's amazing that top grandmasters can see that far ahead...i've read that top gm's only see four or five moves ahead,but i don't believe that......how are you going to pull off combinations like that with such limited vision?.....ten,twelve,fifteen moves is more like it,i think
Apr-25-08  Bowf: I remember studying this very instructive game when it was published at the time. White must meet 6...h5 with the prophylactic move 7 h3! The advance ...h4 is then met by g4.

Where I live (in Scotland) this defensive idea has been successfully employed by some very strong players. Paul Motwani played it once against Roddy McKay. Black played the tempting piece sacrifice on g4, but white was able to defend camly and went on to win.

Jan-12-11  cuppajoe: Nunn has to be the only player in the twentieth century who scored _two_ brilliancies against the Vienna game (J Ost-Hansen vs Nunn, 1974 is the other one.)
Jan-09-12
Premium Chessgames Member
  Domdaniel: <cuppajoe> Nunn has (or had) a strange habit of doing things in pairs. He lost twice to Hebden in a line of the London System where the White attack is supposedly amateurish, and useless against GMs.

First game: Hebden vs Nunn, 1997

As he said himself: "Unfortunately, the opening was the so-called 'Barry Attack'. It is quite a good idea to give your favourite opening a ridiculous name, because if somebody does lose to it then they have to admit that ... they lost to the 'Monkey's Bum', 'Barry Attack' or whatever, compounding their misery and making them more apprehensive about the next game."

Very true: the next game lasted 23 moves -- Hebden vs Nunn, 1998

And then he lost twice to Baburin in a drawish line of the Neo-Grunfeld, where the normally solid Baburin roused himself to produce two brilliant attacks.

This is the 2nd one: Baburin vs Nunn, 2006

The first, from ten years earlier, isn't in the CG database.

These *three* examples aside, there are yet further cases of Nunn doing the same thing twice.

Jan-14-12
Premium Chessgames Member
  maxi: Houdini lays the blame for White's downfall basically on two Rook moves, 18.Rg1 and 23.Re1.
Apr-05-14  Conrad93: I could watch this guy's game forever.

His style of chess was very interesting in comparison to the Draw Masters today like Kramnik and Anand.

Oct-19-16
Premium Chessgames Member
  Fusilli: <An Englishman: Good Evening: What intrigues me is how calmly Nunn finishes his development *after* the Queen sac. Notice how White has to start giving material back simply because Black is bringing out his pieces.>

I was quite impressed by exactly the same thing.

Apr-19-18
Premium Chessgames Member
  Sally Simpson: An excellent example of an intuitive positional Queen sac.

Some above think The Doc saw it all but reading the notes in his (and Griffiths) 'Secrets of Grandmaster Play'. He tells you why the White Queen is practically useless in this position.

Black has just played Nxf4


click for larger view

There is no way to open up the position for the White Queen to be effective, add that to the lack of targets.

They supply analysis saying White's best defensive try was 16.Bf3 with a later c3. White played Bf3 one move too late.

Nunn also admits he completely missed White's 11.Nxg7+ which again confirm he did not see everything.

A wonderful inspiring game with the critical moment, the Queen sac, based on experience and judgement.

Apr-13-24
Premium Chessgames Member
  WTHarvey: Black mates in 4.


click for larger view

33. ... ?

if 34.fxg4 ♖gf2

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