It’s Your Move: daily chess puzzle # 153

White to play and win

Fischer v Durao, Havana Olympiad 1966

Solution

A nice puzzle, which took me a while to solve: to play 1 Nf6+ or not?

Finding that nothing ‘clicked’ after 1 Nf6+, my first thoughts were to exploit Black’s near zugzwang, improve the rooks, and then ‘do something’. But I couldn’t see what to do here either, until, back to ever reliable Examine All Biffs, I saw 1 Na5! and its point.

If Black doesn’t take the N, he has simply lost an important pawn. But if captures it, then 2 Nf6+ Ke7[] 3 Rb7+ is decisive.

Very nice.