A Brilliant Tactic From The Chebanenko Memorial
It was only a rapid event, but the reduced time control didn't prevent German GM Arkadij Naiditsch from finding a stunning tactical idea:
It's Black to move (the leadup was 16.Ng3-f5 Be6xf5 17.g4xf5), and it looks like White is in good shape. Black's rooks are doubled on the d-file, sure, but with pawns on c2 and d3 there's nothing for them to do. The bishop on g7 would be great for pressure on b2, but there's a pawn on e5 and it's well-protected. The queen is doesn't coordinate with anything on b6, while the knight is good on d5 but without a job to do. So what did Naiditsch come up with? (Try to solve it before reading the next sentence.)
I'll give the first move with the hat tip, and the next question, whose answer can be found here (along with the rest of the game), is how White should - or perhaps instead, shouldn't - respond.
Happy analysis!
(HT: Chess Today [17...c4])
Reader Comments (3)
I did get the 17..c4 on my own. However, your description of the position was a big hint. Once you made it clear what was keeping Black from breaking down White's position, finding the "can opener" was easy to spot.
You still have the very best blog on chess I have come across keep up the great work.
PS It was tough seeing Notre Dame lose to Louisville yesterday. Their OT win at USF seemed to have worn them out. Hopefully with some rest they can do well in the NCAA tournament.
[DM: Thanks, both on the comment on the blog and for the commiseration/well-wishes for Notre Dame!]
It's funny, but to me it seemed ... c4 and ... Nc3+ were both kind of obvious. My problem was that I couldn't figure out what to do then! It's the Qxf2 that I couldn't find. The first two moves clear the file for the Black rooks, but I just couldn't get the other part. Then again, I'm pretty sure that without the suggestion that something was there I wouldn't have even looked. That's why I'm only a 1700 after all!
[DM: Ah, but now that you've seen the tactic, you can move up a bit in the world, and so on as you accumulate further ideas!]
Looking at the position more the tactics really seem rather simple. It's just a couple of line clearing sacrifices followed by a simple deflection. The trick is that the first move clears two different lines. That's why I wasn't spotting ... Qf2 - I simply wasn't considering that the b6-f2 diagonal had opened up. "Blinkered" is the appropriate term to describe my thought process!
Now in Chen-Velikanov in the previous post, we've got pins, pawn storms, sacrifices, potential discovered checks, counter-pins, a king walk, and a whole mess of other stuff. Basically it is a kitchen sink attack that co-ordinates brilliantly. What a glorious mess this game of ours is!