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| Sep-22-13 | | M.Hassan: "Insane"
Black to play 27...?
Black is a pawn up.
I have done the first two moves right and the rest is with the help of Chessmaster: 27..........Rxc3+
28.bxc3 Rb8
29.Re7 Qa5
30.Kd1 Qxa3
31.Rf2 Ba4+
32.Ke1 Ne4
33.Rxe4 Bxc3
34.Rfe2 Bxd2+
35.Rxd2 Qc1+
36.Kf2 Qxd2+
0-1 |
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| Sep-22-13 | | avidfan: 
click for larger viewThe White king is in a mating net if White plays:
38.Qxf7 Qd1+ prevents the king from going to g4
39.Kf4 Rf2+ (not 40.Rf3 Qxf3#)
40.Ke4 Qe2+ 41.Re3 Qc2+ forces
32.Rd3 Qxd3# |
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| Sep-22-13 | | morfishine: A sharp Dragon structure where the deciding factor is simply "Who's turn is it?" One of my favorite books is "The Sicilian Dragon" New and Revised by Gufeld & Schiller (2011). Attacking plans by Black focus on the Rook-sac at <c3> & sacrifices at <g4>. One will typically set up the other. Here, both are possible, the Question being "Which one first?" 27...Nxg4 (unmasking the Dragon Bishop) only works if White accepts the sac with 28.hxg4. Then Black continues 28...Rxc3. However, here White has the intermezzo 28.Bxb3, thus by process of elimination, Black first plays the classical rook-sac <27...Rxc3+>: 27...Rxc3+ 28.bxc3 Rb8 (prevents 29.Bb1 & 29.Bxc4)
With no desire to attempt to visualize the ensuing complications, I stopped here *****
PM: I decided to look at the game and think White should undercut Black's follow up sacrifice on <g4> with <29.Bxf6> After 29...Bxf6 30.g5 hxg5 31.fxg5 Bg7 32.Re7 Bf5 33.Rxf5 gxf5 34.Qf2 White has avoided the major dangers and is only a pawn down:
click for larger view***** |
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Sep-22-13
 | | Penguincw: I thought Ne4 would've been a good move. |
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| Sep-22-13 | | gofer: I got nowhere with this. I went for...
<27 ... Rxc3>
<28 Qxc3 Nxd5>
<29 Qc2 ...>
At which point I couldn't see any clear way forward for black.
Yes there were options, but nothing that amazing.
But looking back on the earlier moves in the game, I am confused by <22 Bb1?>. What is so wrong with <22 Bxc4>? 
click for larger view |
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| Sep-22-13 | | bubuli55: 27... Ne4
28. Rxe4 Bxc3
29. bxc3 Rb8
30. Bxb3 Qxb3
31. Qc2 Qxa3+
32. Kd1 Rb2
33. Qc1 Qb3+
34. Ke1 Qxc3+
35. Kd1 Qd3+
36. Ke1 Qxe4+
37. Kd1 Rb1 wins the Q
And the game :) |
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| Sep-22-13 | | bubuli55: What? And I thought I had forcing moves. San Antonio! |
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Sep-22-13
 | | patzer2: The best I could find for today's Sunday puzzle was 27...Rxf3! However, I played it purely as a positional attacking move and not as a tactic. My thought was it either wrecks White's pawn structure and exposes the King position after 28. bxc3 Rb8! or wins a pawn with an attacking initiative after 28. Qxc3 Nxd5. Plugging it into the computer to find a clue, indicates 28. Qxc3 is probably White's best chance to hold with only a slight advantage for Black. Fritz 12 gives 27...Rxf3! 28. Qxc3! Nxd5 29. Qd2 c3! 30. Qxd5 Be6 31. Qd3 Bxa2 32. bxc3 Bb3! 33. f5! Qa5  |
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| Sep-22-13 | | Marmot PFL: Lots of complicated lines, missed a key move 30...Nxg4. Dont understand white's play either, why not 22 Bxc4? |
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| Sep-22-13 | | psmith: <morfishine> After your 29. Bxf6 Bxf6 30. g5, Fritz finds 30... Bf5! 31. Kd1 Bg7! which it considers good for Black. |
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| Sep-22-13 | | Patriot: Wow--not very many comments on this one! :-)
I had a very tough time on this with so many options and certainly did not find anything combination-wise. 27...Rxc3 seems very speculative at best. At 22-ply, Houdini thinks black has a 0.57 pawn advantage, and that's it! It is the best move and because the rook is threatened anyway, it does make a lot of sense because 28.bxc3 looks to be the only move without allowing a discovered attack. This makes white's position look pretty bad but black still has a lot to prove. I'm certain one of the problems is that even though I noticed the exchange was threatened, I didn't look long enough to see that the rook is trapped! That should be enough to signal a desperado may be needed. So instead I focused a lot on other candidates, only to find they just weren't working out. |
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Sep-22-13
 | | Once: Well, yes, but it's not really a puzzle, is it?
As the curtain rises we find ourselves in the gore-splattered landscape of a Sicilian dragon. It's a post apocalyptic wasteland where the few remaining survivors kill each other in the shattered remains of a ruined city. And as any e4 or Sicilian player will tell you, it all hinges on who gets his attack in first. Black dreams of Rxc3. White dreams of f5 or h5. Downton Abbey this most certainly is not. It's black to move and 27...Rxc3 is available. In a time of war, surely that's all we need to know. Leave the variations to the peacemakers. |
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| Sep-22-13 | | Patriot: <bubuli55> I also considered 27...Ne4 but 28.Nxe4 (the candidate you didn't consider?) Rxb2 29.Qxb2 Bxb2+ 30.Rxb2 exchanges queen and a pawn for a knight, bishop, and rook. The material is pretty close to even. There really isn't anything spectacularly winning in this position. 27...Rxc3+ is the only move that gives black an advantage (by slightly more than half a pawn). |
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| Sep-22-13 | | Patriot: <Once> I agree--it's not really a puzzle. <It's black to move and 27...Rxc3 is available. In a time of war, surely that's all we need to know. Leave the variations to the peacemakers.> I thought there were still a lot of other candidates to consider to see if they work. There are a lot of "seeds of tactical destruction". For example, the g7-bishop aiming down on c3 and b2, the barely defended pawn on b2, and the possibility of a discovered attack via ...Nxd5 or ...Ne4 at some point, etc. The candidate <bubuli55> chose makes use of these factors and really isn't bad because white has only a very slight (close to even) material edge. So without doing a lot of analysis on 27...Rxc3+ how can one really know it isn't worse than 27...Ne4? The fact that this is a <CG> problem (I won't say puzzle), can clue us in that 27...Rxc3+ is likely the candidate but during a game this clue doesn't exist. |
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Sep-22-13
| | Once: <Patriot> I think there's another clue to lead us to 27...Rxc3. The pawn structure of the opening position screams our Sicilian dragon. And whether you play that opening or play against it, you just know that the player of the black pieces will be itching to get Rxc3 in. So while there are quite a few candidate moves if we look at the position from an abstract point of view, as soon as we factor in the opening Rxc3 appeals. |
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| Sep-22-13 | | Patriot: <Once> You may very well be correct. I'm not a Sicilian player so I wouldn't be aware of this. Thanks for the info! |
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| Sep-22-13 | | parisattack: It certainly has some Dragon characteristics, but with the c-file closed, bit of a stretch. The rook exchange sac usually comes from the c-file vertically not the b-file horizontally. More Benoni-like, or Sniper to me. |
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Sep-22-13
 | | agb2002: Black is one pawn ahead.
White threatens 28.Bxb3.
Not very inspired today. I'd play 27... Rxc3+ and see what happens. If 28.bxc3 Qa5 and if 28.Qxc3 Nxd5, probably with enough compensation. |
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| Sep-22-13 | | Kikoman: My candidate is <27. ...Rxc3+> also. And it seems that <27. ...Ne4> is bad for black so I choose the 1st one. :D |
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| Sep-22-13 | | MostlyWatch: <morfishine> "One of my favorite books is..." I wonder if some of you might like "The Warrior Within" by Matt Hyer. A time traveler arrives from a couple of thousand years in the past, to help this high school kid with his problems (which are of course the problems of Everyman, but in a Mormon setting.) Sees a chess board set up and is immediately interested. Stares at it a few moments and sez "This is a a battle." "Yes." The guy was in a lot of battles in his day, and after losing a couple of games, starts winning. |
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| Sep-22-13 | | bubuli55: < Patriot: <bubuli55> I also considered 27...Ne4 but 28.Nxe4 (the candidate you didn't consider?) Rxb2 29.Qxb2 Bxb2+ 30.Rxb2 exchanges queen and a pawn for a knight, bishop, and rook. The material is pretty close to even.
There really isn't anything spectacularly winning in this position. 27...Rxc3+ is the only move that gives black an advantage (by slightly more than half a pawn). > < Patriot > Thanks for pointing that out :) |
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Sep-23-13
| | patzer2: <MostlyWatch> <I wonder if some of you might like "The Warrior Within" by Matt Hyer.> With this novel obviously targeted for Mormons or their proselytes and a rank of #8,240,392 in Book sales on Amazon, I think I'll pass. |
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| Jul-03-14 | | jerseybob: gofer & MarmotPFL: 22.Bb1?! rather than 22.Bc4 is an attempt at the cost of a pawn to keep the bishop on an aggressive diagonal. Gligoric isn't fazed in the least. I think white's whole setup is questionable. |
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Jul-03-14
 | | perfidious: The motif 22.Bb1, rather than the obvious recapture at c4, is standard stuff in the Saemisch KID for White--I learnt this in the late 1970s as an 1800 player. |
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| Jul-03-14 | | jerseybob: perfidious: But this is an unusual Saemisch, with so many open lines more like a Benoni, and I don't know if white has that luxury. |
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Kibitzing
sac: 27...Rxc3+