24.Qh7+ Kxh7 25.Bf7#; 24...Kf8 25.Qh8#.

Some backward analysis:

<13.Nxh7, a nice sac although not the strongest move, after 13...Nxe5 14.Nxf8 Qxf8 15.Rh4 f5 16.Qh5 Nbc6 17.Be3 Qd8?> (17...Bd8 18.Qh8+ Kf7 19.Qxf8 Kxf8 20.Rh8+ Kf7 21.Be2 g5 22.Nc5 Bc8 white wins the exchange, but no clear overwhelming win)

Stronger and probably winning was
13.exf6 gxf6 14.Nxh7 Ne5 15.Qh5 Rf7 16.Rh4 Rg7 17.Nxf6+ Kf8 <17...Qxf6 18.Qe8+ Qf8 19.Rh8+ Kxh8 20.Qxf8+ Rg8 21.Qh6#> 18.Nh7+ Ke7 19.Bg5+ Kd6 20.Be4 Bxe4 21.Rd1+ Kc6 22.Na5+ Bxa5 23.Bxd8 Nf3+ 24.Kf1;

also strong was 13.Qh5 fxg5 14.Bxg5 Rxf2 15.Rxf2 Bxf2+ 16.Kxf2 Qf8+ 17.Rf4 Qe8 18.Rh4

<18.Nc5 Ng6?> (18...Bxc5);

Stronger and winning was 18.Bxf5 exf5 19.Qh7+ Kf7 20.Qxf5+ Qf6 21.Qxf6+ gxf6 22.Bxb6.

<22.Be2 forces mate: 22... Be7 23.Bh5 Bxg5 24.Qf7+ Kh8 25.Bg6+ Bh6 26.Rxh6+ gxh6 27.Qh7#>

*****
<TheoNov> Why would 12.Ng5 be a good move for a Sunday POTD? I don't see anything insane or difficult about this move

Black threatens 24... Nxg6.

White can deliver mate in two with 24.Qh7+:

A) 24... Kxh7 25.Bf7#.

Indeed, 12.Ng5 is a storng move, prepairing for Qh5, Nxf7 and Bxg6:

a) 12...h6 13.Nxf7 Rxf7 14.Bxg6 Re7 15.Bg5 Nc6 16.Qh5

b) 12...Bc6 13.Rb4 h6 <13...a5 14.Rxb6 Qxb6 15.Qh5 h6 16.Nxf7> 14.Nxf7 Rxf7 15.Bxg6

Let me take you to the hallowed lands of Middle Earth where small creatures with unfeasibly hairy toes do remarkably brave things whilst slightly larger (but still small) creatures with hairy chins eat and drink a lot.

Or, more precisely, come with me and the Best Boy in the World to the Odeon cinema in Guildford, Surrey where the low-lying areas are doing a fair impersonation of that rubbish film with Kevin Costner. Not, not that one. Or that one. Waterworld - that's the one.

Anyhoo, we pay a king's ransom to put 3D glasses on top of my 2D glasses and watch The Hobbit 2, the Desolation of Smaug. Great film, not as good as the book, Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson are in it!, but most of all ....

... we are introduced to the concept of the ninja elves. These guys are CGI awesome. They can stab an orc to the left, reverse the blade to kill an orc to the right and then a backwards under the arm jab to kill a third orc, before firing off a single arrow which eviscerates not one but two nasties who just happened to be conveniently standing one in front of the other. And all that before the annoyingly noisy family behind us could munch through ... ooh at least three or four pieces of popcorn.

Now I like a bit of cartoony orc-despatching as much as the next man. But there comes a point where all this "killing two orcs with one blow" stuff starts to get a bit unrealistic. I mean, can you really believe that Legolas could stand with one foot on a dwarf's head (said dwarf being in a barrel being swept down a series of rapids) whilst his other foot is on top of another dwarf's head engaged in a similar act of liquid locomotion and be able to fire an arrow to kill two orcs at once?

I mean, really! Like. And other youthful expressions of suspension of disbelief. You would never be able to do something like that in the far more sensible world of chess.

Except that sometimes you can. With 24. Bf7+, white simultaneously puts his bishop en prise, blocks off g8, blocks off g6 and unveils a check which also happens to be mate. Discovered check - the ninja elves of the chess world.

All the bishop would need would be a straight blond wig and blue eyes and we would be rolling our rrrrs with every Moorrdorrr...

Incidentally, the BBITW has got me hooked on this ...

Of these 177 games...
47.7% are won by white
18.4% are drawn
33.9% are won by black.

Or put it another way, there are 244,622 games on the database that start with 1. d4. Of these:

37.4% are won by white
38.8% are drawn
25.7% are won by black.

Hmm. There are several ways of interpreting this. White does win almost half of all Polish Defence games ... boo, hiss.

But then Black does win more games with the Polish defence than with most other defences to 1. d4. Honourable mention should be made here of 1. d4 h5 which has been played 4 times (6 times it you include transpos) ...with black winning 100% of the games.

The other way of looking at it is that the polish defence has half the number of draws as the average for 1. d4. Only 18% of draws compared with 36% for other d4 defences. And of these games that were previously draws, white wins 10% of the 18% and black gets 8%.

Naturally the stats are skewed by the relative gradings of the players and the age of some of the games.