An Interesting Position

As White I reached this position on chessdotcom; Black to play.

 

      Obviously Black is threatened with the capture of his f-Pawn and my h-Pawn could be a threat, so what should he do?

       Black panicked and played 38…Nxe5? and after 39.dxe5 Rxc3+ 40.Kd2 Rc2+ 41.Kd1 Rc4 42.Rxf7+ he eventually lost.  However, there was no need to panic.  I won’t go into a lot of analysis, but engine analysis shows that 38...Rh2 going after the h-Pawn straightway leads to a win for White as does both 38...Ke8 and 38...Rxc3.  Still, after any of these moves the road to victory seems an arduous one and I’m not sure I would have found the way.
       What was interesting was the defense 38...Bf5! Everyone who thinks I would have found 39.Rxf5! raise your hand….What?...Nobody?  You are right; I would have played 39.Bg7 and after 39…Rxc3 40.Kd2 Ra3 41.h6 Ra2+ 42.Kc3 Ra3+ it’s only a draw.

The best line runs: 39.Rxf5! exf5 40.Kxd3 Rh2 41.Nh7 Rh3+ 42.Kd2 Rxh5 43.Bg5+ f6 44.Bxf6+ Kf7 45.Ng5+

      And now, according to the engines, White has an easy win.  Maybe if you’re rated high enough, but for me it looks like White has a difficult technical win.

      I don’t have a moral to this but just thought it was an interesting position.