This week, we’ll begin a new format on this tab of the Decorah Sjakklubb’s website. We’ll cover an opening, a puzzle, and an endgame with each post.
Evans Gambit
A while ago, I covered the Fried Liver Attack off an Italian Game. White can also play Evans Gambit off the Italian Game. We first get things going with:
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. b4!?
The idea of Evans Gambit play is to trade the pawn (and/or pawns) for more advanced development (Winning Chess Openings; 2003, Yasser Seirawan). The best move for black is to accept the gambit.
4 … Bxb4 5. c3 Ba5 6. d4
We could diverge quite a bit from here. The Stockfish engine prefers the following defensive continuation.
6 … d6 7. Qb3 Qd7.
Let’s follow a path in which black gobbles up white’s pawns instead.
6 … exd4 7. 0-0 dxc3 8. Qb3 Qf6 9. e5 Qg6 10. Nxc3 Nge7 11. Ba3 0-0 12 Rad1
At this stage, black is two pawns up but the game is even with white in a much better position.
A Brutal Move
The following puzzle comes from puzzle 820 in the book 1001 Chess Exercises for Beginners by Franco Masetti & Roberto Messa. I’ve been slowly working my way through this delightful book over the last year now and will sometimes find puzzles that I love. The correct move here took me quite a while to find, but once I landed on it I knew it was the right one. It is, as the title suggests, a brutal move. Before I say more, please take some time to find it. Black to play on this puzzle.
I have to say, I toiled for a while on this one but it was worth my time finding it. I’ll provide a few hints in the next paragraph if you need them, and the solution in the paragraph after.
The first hint is that this is not a mate in 2, 3, 4 or more puzzle. The second hint is that the move you are looking for threatens a mate in the next move or few moves if white doesn’t give up pieces.
The solution is to move the queen to e2. Observe how huge of a threat this move is to white. White cannot capture the queen because black has a checkmate on the next move with rook to f1. White cannot capture the rook on f2 because after the queen captures the bishop on f2 for check and backs white’s king into the corner, mate follows when then queen captures the rook on e1.
The chess engine suggests there is mate in 12 after moving the queen to e2.
Fake Stalemate
This endgame analysis comes from Joel Benjamin in his July 2022 US Chess magazine article Rook Pawn Magic. Look at the following position for white.
With white having a rook pawn and a bishop that is not the same color as the queening square of that rook pawn, it seems for a moment that black has a great opportunity for a stalemate. All black has to do is continually threaten control of the a8 square. However, black’s biggest weakness is the b7 pawn that will have to move in a “fake stalemate”. Consider the following sequence of moves.
49 … Kh8 50. Bc3+ Kh7 51. Bg7!
Black has no other move than to advance his b-pawn. This is white’s strategy… to force this move until his rook pawn on the a-file can capture it! Play continues.
51 … b6 52. Bf8 Kh8 53. Bh6 Kh7 54. Bg7!
Again, another “fake stalemate” that makes black advance his b-pawn. If black does not resign, white repeats these moves until he can take black’s b-pawn, and then promotes it while capturing black’s a-pawn with the bishop.
Decorah Sjakklubb 