Whenever I hear the words “you can’t miss it” I feel shivers in my spine. I recall the guy who sold me, years ago, a self-assembled book-cabinet with the assurance that the assembly tasks were very easy: “Piece of cake” - he said - “There is no way you can miss it”. Or the bystander who explained to me how to reach my destination: “Third turn to the left, fourth turn to the right and after 300 meters you’ll see a building shaped as a cow - you can’t miss it”. Well, you know what happened.  Nowadays I know that I can miss almost everything, and probably will.

Are there chess positions that we are certain to handle correctly and ‘can’t miss’?   In my book “Danger in Chess” (Cadogan 1994, Dover 2003) I tried to map the dangerous, most critical moments of a chess game. I reckoned that “perhaps the most dangerous moment... is, paradoxically, just before victory is achieved”. This conclusion has only strengthened in my mind during the years.

Let’s see some examples:

Ed. Lasker - Janowsky
New-York 1924

White to play

42.f4  This should have been the deciding move, as 42...Bd4 allows 43.Re8+ Kb7 44.f6 Rg1+ 45.Kd2.

42...Rg1+ 43.Kd2 Rb1 44.Qh5  Guarding against 44...Rb2+ and augmenting his own attack.

44...Qg7 45.Qe8+  45.f:e5 is also good as 45...Qg2+ 46.Re2 Rb2+ 47.Kc3 R:e2 48.Qe8+ mates shortly.

45...Ka7 46.Qg6??  He misses it. 46.f:e5 as well as 46.Qe7+ win easily.

46...B:f4+! and Black wins, as the path of his queen to b2 is cleared.

T. Petrosian - D. Bronstein
Amsterdam Candidates 1956

White to play

This notorious game is usually quoted from its 35^th move; however, it is only by following the preceding events that we can understand what really happened.

28.b4 c:b4 29.Q:b4 Nf5 30.Rad1 Nd4 31.Re1 Nc6 32.Qa3 Nd4 33.Rb2 Nc6 34.Reb1 Nd4

“White’s pieces occupied all the valuable strategic points... Black was so tied up that he could not undertake even the most modest maneuver to improve his position... Bronstein was moving a knight back and forth...” (V.L. Vasiliev in “Tigran Petrosian, his life and games”).

35.Qd6 Nf5 36.Ng5?? N:d6 0:1

Gilruth - Solomon
World open, Philadelphia 2001

White to play

38.Raa7 Rf8 39.Rc6 Rd8 40.Rcc7 Rf8 41.g:h4 g:h4 42.f4 h3

Black, close to Zugzwang, is in dire straits. In his notes (www.thechessdrum.net), the Black player suggested the plan 43.Be4, Ke3-f3, with an eventual f4-f5. Instead...

42.Ke3!? Bg4! 44.Rc6 Rfe8+ 45.Kf2 Rbd8! 46.R:b6 Bf5

Suddenly, Black has counter-play. After 47.B:f5 K:f5 48.R:f7+ Kg4 the outcome is not so clear. In this line, 48.Kf3 may be an improvement. Hereabouts White squanders the rewards of his previous play:

47.Be2? Re4 48.Kf3 Rb4 49.Raa6 Rb3+ 50.Kf2 Rb2 51.Kf1 Re8 52.R:d6+ Kg7 53.Rf6 Bc8

Kaspi - Haimovitch
Israel Open Ch. 1997

White to play

1.Kg7 Ne7 2.Bf2?!

2.Kf7 Nf5 3.Bf4 Kd8 4.h6 N:h6 5.B:h6 Kc7 6.Be3 Kd6 7.Ke8 wins.

2...Ke6 3.h6??

3.Kf8 Nf5 4.b6 still wins.

3...Nf5+ 4.Kg6 N:h6 4.K:h6 Kd5 5.b6

Forced; otherwise 5...b6 6.B:b6 Kc4=.

5...Kd6  ½-½

It transpires that this position is unwinable! 6.Bg3+ Kd7 7.Kg6 Kc8 8.Kf7 Kd8 and the Black king cannot be expelled from c8 and d8, as 9.Bf4 Kc8 10.Ke7 is stalemate.  A draw.

Wall - Wise
England 1995

White to play

The natural - and correct - winning plan is to post the White knight where it can fork f7 and b7. With his king on f8 this will carry the day for White. 

41.a4

41.Ke7 Be6 42.Kf8 is straightforward.

41...Bf1 42.Kc5 Bg2 43.Kd6 Bf1 44.Kc7 Bg2 45.Kb8 a6 46.Kc7 Bf3 47.b5? a:b5 48.a:b5 Bg2 49.b6 Bc6

By exchanging the queenside pawns white missed his chance, since if he posts his king on f8 and his knight on d8, Black will place his bishop on d5, when the sequence 1.N:f7+ B:f7+ 2.K:f7 will result in a stalemate.

White to play

White tried to move his king or knight, but his adversary pointed that this was illegal.  Then White exclaimed that it was stalemate, but Black objected by saying that the white d6-pawn could still move.  Reluctantly, White played his only legal move - which turned out to be a huge, forced success:

1.dxe7 mate!