Most Common ICC Blunder Leads to Epaulette Mate

 Blitz Player rf(Robert Fischer diehard fan probably)  usually crushes me, but today he blundered trying to castle Queenside. I don't have incontrovertible proof, but with the center wide open he moved his Queen to d1 rather than TRIPLE O.

Do you see the mate in 2 in the position below with Black to move?  Rc1 attracts Whites rook to that square and then mate at d2 for the shouldered White Monarch. Note that Epaulette Mates would NOT BE THING if two pieces could occupy same square!

So, Yup attempted castling is the most common blunder. I guess some people just can not get used to King being able to move two squares.

Was I playing Monkey; I mean former business colleague

A computer programmer that I sort of knew popped into my mind during the following blitz game. I did not know him well but he had a reputation as an excellent debugger and trouble shooter among the project leads and the developers or coders as they are called these days. 

Tom Holmen was logical guy that would explain his love of chess. Toguho, a monkey from Finland, played weakly in opening, dropping a pawn for nothing and then just running his h pawn down the board neglecting his development. 

His punishment was the lost ending you see where White has two minor pieces for the Rook and will win comfortably.  Last I heard, he was doing HR work and liking it, but we ended up in different countries so it has been awhile. 

 

Two Distinct Mating Patterns Decide this Sloppy Contest

 Norwegian Chess player Mark Fatty Thomas(markfattythomas) was in poor form lucky for me since he usually chews me up and spits me out Marvin Huckaby style.

The ICC blitz player when in for a piece sacrifice which was unsound owing to his ultra aggressive mood I suspect.

In the above diagrammed position White had a mate in two which is an enormous amount of information rendering this a trivial tactic to find. Problem in the game is the combatants HAVE TO KNOW IT IS A MATE IN 2 rather than sitting around on their couch in this Delta Mutation hell with a captioned position to work from.

White instinctively castled not noticing the forcing mate in 2 variation. The motif of two mating patterns simultaneously is what decides the game quickly

What can happen when one attacks just because they feel aggressive

 For some reason the name Nicholas Ernest de Firmian flashed through my conscious after reviewing the following chess position illustrated in the diagram. I think Nick and GM Chistiansen were close back in the late 90s. Larry works for USCF and I think Nick distanced himself from the Royal Game. I was at a tournament in Florida when Larry, in a Jacksonville Hotel Bar, lamented the truth that the US is owned/run by insurance companies. He is a good guy one time giving a 60 board simul in Lubbock Texas pre Susan Polgar.  

After a few moments of ennui, I realized it was because Nick espoused/endorsed Jeremy Silman's famous work titled "How to Reassess Your Chess" where he made the term imbalance a wildly popular chess teacher word. Don't know if de Firmian made any money  off calling Jeremy's book the most seminal positional piece of chess literature since My System. 

ICC player extrauniversal2, from Denmark, commenced an unjustified attack which resulted in his King side pawns being maimed. White rejected winning material in favor of long term positional squeeze. The Danish player committed the chessic sin of attacking because he "just felt like it" and had to resign 12 moves later. 

Naked Pin Ends this game of Chess

 If naked pin is not a tactical motif, then it should be. What happened to American player WildRaven is actually called a deflection sacrifice

In the above diagrammed position, Black just played Rd5 protecting his b5 pawn and "keeping an eye" on White's far advanced d7 pawn. The winning  move is easy to discover if one realizes the simple truth that a Queen is invariably worth more than a Rook. HInt: What is the only move White can make to prevent Queen Pawn from becoming a lovely lethal lady? Alliteration for choice!

Incidentally, I have never understood why WildRaven has a USCF rating below 1600. He is such an uncompromising and principled player at the Internet Chess Club in Pennsylvania!

Also Kenny Lucky can tell your more about Naked Pin as it relates to Mary Wollstonecraft.

Hippopotamus In Reverse Catastrophe

 South African  chess player btropic played  soooo poorly with the White pieces that Black's seventh move Bf2 check leads to forced win.

In the diagrammed position, White his timidly set up what appears to be a Hippopotamus defense in reverse. Note that White's monarch is surrounded by its own forces in Epaulette fashion. He was duly punished with the attraction sacrifice Bishop capture King Bishop 2 pawn check in the old English descriptive notation. 

After Ng4 check, the a1 rook in the corner gets ingested and gets reactivated via c2 square. Would like to know if Alessio De Santis has ever essayed the Reverse Hippo and how he fared. 

Also why would a chess player play such a gutless, mindless opening with White?

Elegant Square Clearing Pawn Move

 Austrian Chess player Arsenal11 must have thought he stood no worse after the solid looking g6 pawn move. After all, his King on e6 had the opposition over its White counterpart on the e4 square.

However, he overlooked the game winning space clearance move pawn to f5 EXCLAM. So what space was cleared from this temporary pawn sacrifice? The f4 square, to be occupied by White Monarch, is the answer when Black finds himself in Zugzwang( German for NO move I think) 

Not only will Black's f5 fall, but the c5 pawn could be lost in some variations. Also if Black moves his pawn f6, White's g pawn jettisons Bruce Pandolfini! 

BTW, I have heard soccer goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale has more than a mild interest in the Royal Game