Daily chess puzzle

Today’s puzzle is from the penultimate round of the British Chess Championships. The blog was prepared live during the round, and as is my custom, is posted in arrears.

White to play

Mickey Adams v Richard Pert, British Championships, Torquay, 3rd August 2019

Solution

I watched the end of their game live, and couldn’t see how Mickey would increase the pressure. I was thinking of various ideas, such as ‘Alekhine’s gun’ and shuffling the Q to e1, behind the rooks, but even then wasn’t sure. After just over two minutes, Mickey played 1 Qg5! and all was suddenly clear. Qh4-h8 was threatened, and black’s hold snaps.

It is all over now.

The game is a mini-masterpiece, well worth playing through to see how Mickey accurately and quickly got a dominant position by exploiting Black’s slight weaknesses.