The diagram position occurred after black’s twentieth move in the game Schöneberg -Tukmakov (Zinnowitz DSV 4th 1967).

Maybe you recognize the structure. At least there are some remnants of the Keres attack in the Sicilian Scheveningen.

I love the name Scheveningen because hardly any non native Dutch speaker is able to pronounce this name in the correct way. Of course we Dutch have no problems with this. Correct pronouncation…

My mother told me that in the Second World war there was a simple trick to debunk German spies. One would ask the culprit to pronounce the following silly sentence:

Scheveningse schollekop.

Two times ‘sch’ in succesion? No foreigner is able to do this. Warning: don’t try this at home, because you might find your throat in a dangerous twist. The meaning of schollenkop is ‘the head of plaice’ (for my Swedish friends: ‘spätta’). Scheveningse schollekop is the nickname for the people from Scheveningen. They were originally fisherman.

To complete your knowledge: the Siclian Scheveningen variation was first played in a tournament in, you guessed it by now, Scheveningen during the 1923 chess tournament in this village at the North Sea coast near The Hague.

The variation was played several times by several players, including Max Euwe. Another name some foreigners are unable to pronounce correct. For the Swedes, if you spell the name of the fifth world champion like öwe you get it about right.

Now back to the diagram. White has a winning combination. But it is far from easy. The first moves are not difficult to find, but at some moment you have to be very creative to crack this tough nut. White missed his chance and in the end he lost the game. See the solution… (and the whole game).

With thanks to the Chessbase tactics trainer and Mega Database.