Win the hanging queen on a5 (c7)
li-06he7naming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Hanging piece: your opponent left a piece undefended — take it.
Difficulty 2307 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A hanging piece is one that is attacked and not defended, or defended too few times. Count attackers against defenders on each enemy unit; where attackers win, take it — often with an in-between move or a check to gain the extra tempo.
General method: before you move, list the forcing candidates — every check, every capture, every direct threat — and calculate those first. The solution to a tactic is almost always among them.
Position on the board
White: king f1, queen d3, rook g1 g5, knight a5, pawn c3 e3 f3 d4.
Black: king e8, queen c7, rook h2 b4, pawn d5 a6 d6 e6 g7.
9 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 37.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 2 points of material (26 against 24; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on f1, the black king on e8.
It is Black to move on move 37, with 45 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): b, h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: c, f.
The Black king has 5 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
37... Qxa5 38. Qg6+ Kd8 39. Qf6+ gxf6
Why it works
- Great move! queen to a5 keeps the pressure (+3.8).
- Well found: king to d8 (+4.5).
- Strong! pawn to f6 is the sharp choice (+4.7).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qg6+, then Kd8 and you win the knight.
Move by move
- 37… Qxa5 — queen to a5 (capture)
- 38. Qg6+ — queen to g6 with check
- Kd8 — king to d8
- 39. Qf6+ — queen to f6 with check
- gxf6 — pawn to f6 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Winning blow
Find the strike that wins material by force.
A winning blow is a forced material gain that does not fit a single textbook motif. The general tactical recipe applies: spot loose pieces, an awkwardly placed king, overloaded lines. Go through the forcing moves in order of violence — checks, captures, threats — because most combinations start with one of them. Do not judge by feel: calculate the concrete line until the outcome is beyond doubt.
Counter-strike
Don't defend — answer the threat with a bigger one.
The counter-strike: instead of defending against the threat, you answer with a bigger threat of your own. While your opponent grabs a pawn, you deliver mate — the arithmetic favors you. Look for a counter when direct defenses fail: do you have a check, an attack on the queen, a mating threat? The beginner's error is meeting every threat with a reflexive defense without checking the counterattacking resources first.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
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