It is White to move. The White Knight is being attacked. The Knight has 7 squares to move to and White can also play Bxh3. Which would be White’s best move?
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Nxc6
What is the idea of Nc6, anonymous 1:24? Doesn’t it just lose the knight after NxN? Is there any compensation?
I’d play Nf5 with the threat of Ne7+ giving black no time to exchange bishops.
Nf5 also threats Bxh3 so I think there are just two deciderable moves.
1. -, gxf5?! looks bad because of Bxh3 and the pinned pawn f5 will fall. White is up one pawn and his white bishop is very strong having no opponent – in addition to that black’s king position is weak.
So I think 1. -, Bxf5 is best. After 2. exf5, Qxf5 3. Qxd6 white looks much better with that strong bishop (again!) and the weak black pawns. Probably black should defend d6 instead of eating pawn f5 but I though think white is better with the two bishops (and pawn c6 still doesn’t look good to me).
I hope I haven’t overseen anything.
Greetings
Jochen
First of all, BxB is out, because white doesn’t want black’s queen occupying the hole at h3 without the bish to defend the square, with the threat of Ng4.
It would be nice to grab at least a pawn out of this position, however. Nxc6 is possible, but I’d be worried about …BxB, and if NxR (or NxN) …Qh3 with again a threat of Ng4.
So the only other knight move that might snatch a pawn is Nf5, as it both cuts off the black queen from the bishop as well as forces black to respond to the immediate threat of a royal fork on e7.
1 Nf5 PxN
2 BxB and the pawn on f5 is pinned to the queen and captured by the white bishop next move, which is fantastic for white. So black has to capture the other way:
1 Nf5 BxN
2 PxB QxP
3 QxP and white looks pretty good, with a double attack on both the c-pawn and the e-pawn (and the b2 bishop countering the g7 bishop if the knights move); white keeps the g2 bishop that protects the weak light squares f3 and h3 around white’s castle; and by trading off the e-pawn, white’s g2 bishop now has increased its scope along the long diagonal and the e1 rook is now on a semi-open file. Looks like the move to me, unless I missed some cute tactics with one of the other candidate moves.
Jochen said…
“I hope I haven’t overseen anything.”
If you did, then I did too, as it looks like we came to the same conclusions at the same time!
“Nxc6 is possible, but I’d be worried about …BxB, and if NxR (or NxN) …Qh3 with again a threat of Ng4. “
I still wonder what happens after the simple 1. Nxc6, Nxc6 ?
About 1. -, BxB I wouldn’t be worried because of 2. Ne7+ 😉
I can’t imagine that both of you missed that simple recapture?
Greetings
Jochen
“About 1. -, BxB I wouldn’t be worried because of 2. Ne7+ ;)”
Lol!
Jochen said…
“I still wonder what happens after the simple 1. Nxc6, Nxc6 ?
About 1. -, BxB I wouldn’t be worried because of 2. Ne7+ 😉
I can’t imagine that both of you missed that simple recapture?”
D’oh! I saw it after I’d posted, but I don’t know what I was thinking — and of course the knight on c6 threatens a royal fork just as on f5. As you can probably tell, I didn’t play it out over a board and had seen the first poster mention Nxc6 and was too worried about phantom attacks on the kingside to see that it loses to being captured sneaky knight hiding on the edge. Yeah, I’m a little foggy today.
Actually, my fears about 1 BxB were unfounded as well, as after QxB white just protects the h-pawn with Nf3. But keeping that bish seems like a good idea. Or white could play 1 Nf3 as well. But 1 Nf5 BxN 2 PxB QxP 3 QxP still looks the best to me, checking to see how much else I overlooked.
Oh, I did overlook something else, also having to do with that knight hiding out on the side, after
1 Nf5 BxN,
2 PxB g6xf5 is perfectly playable and might be better than QxP, and I didn’t think about that. If now
3 QxP Nxc4!
4 PxN RxB
5 BxP e4 and black has a pretty good game with a rook on the 7th rank, but the material is even. Can white do better? I don’t know.
Hey Tom, finally you forced me to look for my board and pieces. 😉
Here they are, now I can follow your variations better… no, I still can’t follow, I do not understand why “3 QxP Nxc4!
4 PxN RxB” should be good for black.
The bishop on b2 is defended by the rook on b1, so after 5. RxRb2 (why BxPc6?) white is a rook up!?
What’s up today?
Jochen
I dunno the solutions to these puzzles. But if White’s Nd4 has to move, the vacating of d4 immediately raises threats to Black’s pd6.
A safe move like Nd4c2 would give Black ample time to defend pd6 (rf8d8, na5b7, qc8e6).
So examining White’s unexpected moves, Nf5 at least interacts with the tension of Black’s bh3 being under attack, defended only by qc8 pressure that runs thru f5.
jochen said…
“The bishop on b2 is defended by the rook on b1, so after 5. RxRb2 (why BxPc6?) white is a rook up!?”
When I finally set my board up, I placed the rook on a1 instead of b1, and then noticed a new variation, which wasn’t there before because I had the rook in the wrong place. Ok, I’m going to bed now — not getting enough sleep. 🙂