[Puzzle Road] Bishops vs. Pawns: fight for a draw! (P3)

Welcome to Puzzle Road!

We have today our third puzzle and I think, in opposition to the one of yesterday, this one will seem you much more complicated! Alright, we have this time a position, where we can’t win! Yeah, exactly, the objective of this puzzle will be to draw!
But our opponent is strong and won’t blunder: we must play the best moves and don’t miss an opportunity, for example to stalemate with White! Imagine you would have Carlsen as opponent! It would be great because this position is a draw and Black cannot win!

3. Bishops vs. Pawns: the fight for the draw!

First, let’s analyze the position:
- Material: Black has his two Bishops, but White has two passed linked pawns.
- King activity: the Black king does protect the promotion-square of our g-pawn. The White King can’t control the promotion square of the h- pawn now, and the promotion square of the g-pawn is impossible to control because of the pawn structure.
- Promotion squares: h8 is controlled by the black Bishop and the g8-square is controlled by the opponent’s king.
- Possible moves: 1. h8, 1. g7, 1. Kg5

First move: 1. h8 = Queen (!!)

The move 1. Kg5 does loose activity for the white king and does not protect the promotion squares of the h and g pawn… 1. g7 does simply lose a pawn… The only possible move is 1. h8 and this one does permit White to draw with a checkmate! Try now to find the following possible moves and check the solution after having done it. (Black is forced to play 1. … / Bxh8. Else, White does have a Queen more!)

Second move: 2. Kh7 (!!)

A new move I now possible! The h7-square is now free and can be occupied by our king. This does give us a new square: g8 (the promotion square of our g-pawn!) Furthermore, we win a tempo by attacking the opponent’s bishop that’s standing on the h8-square, after having taken our h-pawn. Black cannot protect their bishop and need to move it on a1 for example. Else, it’s at least a draw, because Black has only 1 Bishop and cannot mate with only 1 Bishop…

Third move for a nice stalemate: 3. g7 + !

By playing 3. g7 +, our g-pawn needs only one move more to be promoted into a queen. Our King that stands now on the h7-square does control the g8- square and this forces Black to take the pawn with their bishop: but, oh! If they take, our king cannot move anymore! This means the game is a draw and we are Stalemated!

Incredible! Black had two bishops, we had only 2 pawns, but we still made a draw: this proofs that a pawn can be very dangerous and, correctly moved with the king, can totally change the result of a game!

You probably saw that this puzzle is much more complicated: it’s often more difficult when it’s in an endgame, but it’s still a matter of practice! Practice does make perfect! Continue to follow the Puzzle Road and to think about these positions to increase your capacity to find and play good tactics. If you had missed the old puzzles of the Puzzle Road, do not hesitate to check at the end of this blog the link to the old tactics. Feel naturally free to send me a friend request or to follow this blog if you want to get a notification when the next puzzles will be posted!

Have a good day, have fun in playing chess and good luck for your next tactics!
See you tomorrow for the next puzzle!
@Kyu13