Italian Game: the strike on f7

f7 is the weakest square on the board — defended only by the king. In this classic Italian middlegame, White cashes in on the pressure with a bishop sacrifice.

Lesson

White to move. Main line: 1. Bxf7+ Rxf7 2. Ng5

The bishop gives itself up to drag a defender onto f7, and the knight follows with tempo: Ng5 attacks the rook that just captured, and after it moves White regains the material with a lasting attack against the exposed king.

The prerequisites for this kind of sacrifice are always the same: a bishop aiming at f7, a knight that can reach g5 in one move, and a black king short of defenders. If any of the three is missing, the sacrifice is usually unsound.

This is the kind of moment the Brilliant Move template is built for — the key move gets the gold emphasis, and the continuation shows why declining or accepting both lose material.