Rating 2214 · Expert · attraction, double check, kingside attack, long, mate, mate in 3.
White: king g1; queen c2; rooks a1/f1; bishop d3; pawns a3/b2/d6/e3/f2/g3/h2. Black: king g8; queen f3; rook f8; bishop b7; knight d5; pawns a7/b6/c5/e6/f5/g7/h7. White is ahead by 2 points of material. Black to move.
Black sacrifices the queen with 1...Qxg2+ to decoy the white king onto g2, where it becomes vulnerable to a knight double check. After 2.Kxg2 Nf4+, the king is attacked simultaneously by the knight on f4 and the bishop on b7 along the long diagonal—a double check that forces 3.Kg1 (the only legal king move). Then 3...Nh3# is checkmate: the knight on h3 controls g1 and f2, while the bishop on b7 x-rays through the knight to reinforce the mating net. The king has no escape because g2 is controlled by the knight on h3, h1 is blocked by White's own pawn on h2, and f1 is controlled by Black's rook on f8.
Recognize when sacrificing your queen forces the opponent's king onto a square where your minor pieces deliver unstoppable checkmate. The pattern here is the attraction sacrifice followed by a double check—the king is lured forward by the material gain, then trapped by a forcing sequence it cannot escape. Train yourself to calculate sacrifices where the follow-up is not immediate compensation in material but a forced mate sequence that the opponent cannot interrupt.
attraction, double check, kingside attack, long, mate, mate in 3, middlegame, sacrifice. The combination ends with Nh3# delivering checkmate.
FEN: 5rk1/pb4pp/1p1Pp3/2pn1p2/8/P2BPqP1/1PQ2P1P/R4RK1 w - - 1 22
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Analysis generated with Stockfish 18 and AI assistance. Puzzle data from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).