Anastasia's Mate

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Anastasia's Mate is a typical checkmating pattern that occurs in games. The key things to note are:

  1. A White Knight on e7 (or Black Knight on e2 if transposed).
  2. A Black pawn on g7.
  3. A Black King on h8.

Since the Knight covers the g8 and g6 squares, usually a sacrifice on h7 occurs then the Rook or Queen deliver mate.

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Here Qxh7 followed by Rh3 wins.

Another example:

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A mate in 3 starting with Ne2+.

Recognizing the pattern, we can solve this puzzle from lichess. It's a little bit tricky since move 2 is a quiet move. 😀

https://lichess.org/training/Ge3du

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Anastasia's Mate | Ecency