Queen's Gambit Declined — Win

Friday, October 2, 2026 · vs Sanjoypaul09 · View game on lichess ↗

Before playing a quiet developing or prophylactic move when one of your pieces is under attack, run the forcing sequence first — captures, checks, recaptures — like you should've before queen to c2 here. That single habit would've caught both the blunder and the missed pawn grab later in this game.

• ›Queen to c2 looks natural but completely misses what's coming: Black can play bishop takes knight on c3 with check, and no matter how you recapture, the knight on f6 jumps into e4 and just wins the pawn — recapture with the queen and that knight even forks it. The engine's move, knight to e2, keeps a piece ready to retake on c3 while still guarding e4, so none of this happens. You played this in about a second, which tracks — it's the kind of move that feels automatic until you check the tactics.
• ›Here the pawn on e5 can just take on f6 and win material outright, but instead you played h3 to deal with a pin, letting the moment slip. You actually took twelve seconds on this one, so it wasn't a snap decision — the capture just wasn't on the radar. Good news is your opponent was already shaky from earlier blunders, so the position stayed comfortable anyway.