Cordingley puzzle 142 #chess

White to play and win

Solution

I messed this one up. Badly.

Look at the position, and give yourself 5 seconds to choose a move: 1 Nf7 or 1 Nh7; give yourself 1 second instead: 1 Nh7: 1 Nh7 is the move your hand wants to play. Give yourself a minute, and you look at 1 Nd5, 1 Nf5, 1 Rd7, 1 Qh4, before rejecting them, and deciding the Ng5 has to be sacrificed.

So, I looked at 1 Nh7 first, but couldn't defeat 1…Kh7 2 Qh4+ Kg8: noting that 3 Ng4 wasn't good enough, so I switched to 1 Nf7, found wins against 2…h6, and thought I had found a win against 2…h5. So, pleased with myself, I turned to the solution and was horrified.

I should have been more professional in my approach. Kasimdhanov would say 'have optimistic imagination'; Aagaard would say 'bring all pieces to the party' or 'revolution followed by evolution'. Any or all of these maxims, or just more thought, would have found the rook lift.

This one hurts me. I couldhaveshouldhave done better.

Still, using Houdini, I found that black missed a better defence: Bc5: then, there is only one narrow way to win, but a very pretty one. The attached lines are worth playing through.

Dare I say it, but a nice puzzle.

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