BtM 16A: Knights and pawns

October 1988, Position H


Black to play
Godena - Seirawan, Lugano 1988

Contributions to the comments box are welcome. I’ll reply with what the Masters have to say about their choice to anybody who suggests a move.

Scroll down to see some commentary from me and the Masters’ feedback.

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For today’s position the first question to ask is going to be, "why can’t Black just promote the h-pawn". The answer: "Well you can, but …." Then it’s a case of what you’re going to do about the "but". White’s mating threat means Black’s analysis has to be accurate.

Shirov once said that his favourite phase of a chess game was the ending since that was where he could use his powers of calculation to their fullest. I think he might have enjoyed today’s problem.





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POINTS
10: … Nc6
7:  … Nb5
2:  … Nc8
1:  … h2

MASTERS
… Nc6: Kosten, Conquest, Davies, Flear, Norwood, K. Arkell, P. Littlewood, Botterill
… Nb5: Howell, Pein 

SOURCE

1 … h2, Godena - Seirawan, Lugano 1988

Comments

  1. I just checked with the tablebases, and the masters got it right: 1...Nc6 is the only drawing move.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I didn’t know 7-piece endings were tablebase-able

      Delete

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