“I no longer have any fear of pain because I’m the one inflicting it and can decide when it stops.”
Maude Julien, The Only Girl in the World
History repeats itself with new actors if its lessons are not learned. Lately we have been going over the Greek gift sacrifice with the purpose to know it well. At the beginning of the first lesson a few recognized it from seeing it on the internet. When I asked a few questions about it, I got the usual generalities. Those did not help much to solve the first practice puzzle. After getting our feet wet, one of my students remembered allowing it in one of his games from the last tournament he played. It is not a pretty sight:
White’s light square bishop targets the h7-pawn in many positions. Observation: all I mention applies in the mirror to Black’s dark square bishop and the h2-pawn. It is important to understand the position properly. Sacrificing the bishop works only if certain conditions are met. Players are normally very cautious to protect against any attack on their king; still more often than one would expect, the sacrifice is possible. Replay below game and compare white’s attack with the one above:
The similarities of the two positions are:
- The pawns in front of Black’s king side have not moved
- The h7-pawn is defended only by the ling
- The g5-square is not defended
- One rook can join the attack fast
For more details about the Greek gift sacrifice, please read again a past article from here
Eugen Demian
