Hey friends! I am back today for another blog post about Sacrifices in Chess! You surely have read my most recent articles, The Art of Sacrifices in Chess: Understanding When and How to Give Material, right? Well, I got a message from Daniel (@Daniel9054) yesterday who enjoyed the read of my last article and could reach 1500 just after reading it, by sacrificing in the same game... his Bishop.... and then..... THE ROOOOOOOOOOOOOK!! Two sacrifices analyzed as brilliant by Stockfish and that allowed Daniel to checkmate his opponent with a forced Mate-in-7!
Let's see what happened in his game and we will try to understand why he was right by sacrificing material for a positional advantage and then a mate! We will start with the opening, to see what direction the game took since the first moves, then we will go to the brilliant sacrifice of the Bishop and see the magnifique checkmate he achieved by sacrificing his rook!
The Opening
Daniel started with 1.d4 and chose the Bg5 line; that already shows that he is going to play aggressively. The position already contains a certain tension, as we have the possible trade between the c and d pawns plus the "pinned" knight standing on f6. At the moment, everything's okay with Black's position, but White's idea is clear: they are aiming for an open game and will put as much pressure as they can on d5 to force the trade on c4 to develop their Bishop on c4. In my opinion, trading the bishop for a knight now is a mistake, and I would rather advise playing e3 to have the possible Bxc4 directly and to keep pressure on the d8-h4 line. Daniel preferred the more "easy and direct" line with the trade and later e3.
Here we see Black castled on the King Side. That's a dangerous position for them, as Daniel hasn't castled yet. The idea for White here is to develop the Bishop on d3 to threaten the h7 pawn and the king's castle. Later, we can Queen-Side-Castle, so we will be able to attack with both of our rooks Black's castle and push the g and h pawns. I agree completely with Daniel's next move. I would honestly have played exactly the same! Let's see how the game continued...
In this position, Black's King is completely exposed: it has only 2 pawns "protecting" it and no piece other than the Black Squared Bishop to defend it! Black's Queen is on the other side of the board, and there is no way for Black to start an offensive on White's King or to bring their pieces back quickly enough to save the game! White is clearly winning in this position, and Daniel saw the brilliant Bishop Sacrifice Bxg6 to liquidate the 2 last pawns protecting the King! After Bxg6, fxg6, and Qxg6, White's Queen comes into the King's Castle and just destroys everything, winning back material if Black doesn't move their Bishop from f6 to g7. The problem with Bg7 is that it gets pinned and the only piece to defend it later is the Rook (Re7...) but this is apparently extremely weak! We will see how White will take advantage of the disaster and chaos created by the bishop sacrifice in Black's position on the King Side.
The Second Brilliant Move: THE ROOOOOOOOOOOOOK!
GothamChess would be proud of Daniel! And I am too! You found here a brilliant checkmate in this position, using the fact that Black's King can currently only move on the fields f8 and g8! It's completely blocked, and the move Rh8+ (!!) forces Black to take with the Bishop, and White can mate on the next move by taking back with the rook! This is a very useful tactic that you guys should remember: you have 2 rooks, that means you can put them on the same line/column to then sacrifice one, and come back on the same square with the second one and this time there will be no piece to take it! So well done Daniel, I love that brilliant Rook Sacrifice! Just for fun, let's show again the Magnifique Brilliant Checkmate.
Thank you very much, Daniel, for sharing this game with me! I am extremely happy you shared it with me and accepted to let me analyze it for the community! Also, I am proud of you that you could find these 2 brilliant sacrifices thanks to my article, The Art of Sacrificing in Chess: Understanding When and How to Give Material I hope many of our readers have also developed some new sacrificing skills and could play more such games!
If you have recently played a brilliant game too, got a great position, checkmate network, and wish me to analyze it in a blog post, you can message me anytime; I'm here for you!
I hope you enjoyed reading this article, and I wish you good luck in your next chess games! Have fun playing chess!
Your Kyu ^^
