A mating attack against the long castle...

7/31/2009 – ... is almost half done with a bishop placed on d3 (d6), keeping the enemy king in the c-file. Here Black sent out a clear signal with 23. ... Qxa2 - the white king is to be hunted down with 24...Nb3+. How do you judge the situation now? A) Checkmate can only be prevented by giving up the queen, leaving Black on the victory path; B) Thanks to Black's back rank weakness, White just so manages to escape into a roughly equal endgame; C) White actually wins. The solution is here, but first ponder over it with a larger version of the diagram.