As a junior tournament arbiter 'Can I capture en-passant?' is one of the most common questions I get asked. Players will try and capture en-pas pawns in front of other pawns, pawns that have moved only one square, or just at some random moment in the game. Worse still, some will try and capture their opponents pieces 'en-pas' or try and capture pawns with their pieces in a similar manner.
However there is one situation where experienced players sometimes get a little confused, mainly because it is quite rare. It is where a pawn has advanced to the sixth rank, and then a pawn on the adjacent file pushes two squares ahead. On more than one occasion a player has looked at the board, looked at me and then started with 'Uh, can I uh, hang on, can I ...' I usually just smile and shake my head, or give a longer explanation if asked.
If you look at the game below you will see an example of this after whites 17th move. Of course both players in this game do know the rule, so the title question never came up. What did happen instead was that Caruana just demolished Radjabov in another 18 moves, and move to 4.5/5 in the Gashimov Memorial.
Caruana,Fabiano (2804) - Radjabov,Teimour (2726) [B31]
Vugar Gashimov Mem 2016 Shamkir AZE (5.3), 30.05.2016
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 g6 4. Bxc6 dxc6 5. d3 Bg7 6. h3 Nf6 7. Nc3 O-O 8. Bf4 b6 9. Qd2 Re8 10. O-O-O a5 11. Ne5 b5 12. Qe3 Qb6 13. Bh6 Bh8 14. f4 a4 15. Rhf1 e6 16. g4 a3 17. b4 Nd7 18. Nxd7 Bxd7 19. e5 f5 20. Ne2 Bg7 21. Bxg7 Kxg7 22. h4 fxg4 23. h5 gxh5 24. Ng3 Kh8 25. Nxh5 Re7 26. Nf6 Be8 27. f5 exf5 28. Rxf5 Qc7 29. Rg5 Rg7 30. Rh1 Bg6 31. Rxg4 Qf7 32. Kb1 cxb4 33. Qd4 Bf5 34. e6 Rxg4 35. exf7 Rxd4 36. Ne8 1-0
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