In round one I reached a position in which Black has only one winning move.
There is nothing particularly surprising in that but, in postmorteming the game with two friends I was surprised neither could find the winning move despite trying just about every legal move in the position!
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| Black to make his 49th move in Jose Molto Salido (1662) - Spanton (1940) |
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Black is a pawn up, but the h7 pawn is very vulnerable to White's king.
A move such as 49...Ke5 is easily parried by 50.Rd7, while 49...f5 50.gxf5 gxf5 is not much help as now all Black's pawns are vulnerable.
The solution is:
49...h5
I do not give this an exclamation mark, although it would get one under the John Nunn endgame convention, as I think the move is, or at least should be, fairly easy to find (assuming you already know the idea).
50.gxh5
50.Kf4, as suggested by one friend, is no improvement after 50...Rh3, eg 51.Kg5 Rg3 etc.
50...Re5+ 51.Kg4 Rxh5 (0-1, 56 moves)
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