Queen Sacrifices Win Miniatures

Chessorb Classic, Issue #130 -- GOTM #100

This month we have a daring Queen sacrifice in the opening moves. Takes a bit of bottle to drop the lady early on. Your calculations must be correct or it's going to be a painful day at the office.

Grandmasters have always had such tremendous ability to calculate lines in their heads. The great masters of the 19th Century were as good as any today in this respect. They played some of the most beautiful games in chess history. Of course great chess is being played to this day but the strategies of the Romantic Era did not stand up to the rigours of positional chess.

And yet we can appreciate the genius of the attacking play from this period and allow for the era it was played in. We have a very interesting miniature today from these times. Not just a Queen sacrifice but also a Kingside pawn storm right there in the opening.

By the latter stages of the 19th Century a new power was beginning to emerge in chess. A power that set the stage for this month's battle. This game took place in St Petersburg, Russia in 1874. Victor Knorre had White and Mikhail Chigorin had Black.

Knorre, Victor - Chigorin, Mikhail [C50]

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See you next month.

Ken

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