Botvinnik Part 4:
Fighting to Stay on Top

1958  |  WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP VS SMYSLOV
At the closing of the last article, Botvinnik had lost the world championship to persistent challenger Vassily Smyslov. Luckily for him, due to a controversial clause in the match rules, he got a rematch without having to go through the grueling Candidate’s Tournament. He played no tournaments in between the two matches.

The third Smyslov-Botvinnik world championship match began in 1958. And it was not even close. All that needs to be said is that Botvinnik won the first three games! After that Smyslov never truly recovered. Despite a few wins he simply ran out of time, and Botvinnik won with a score of 12.5-10.5.  Below are two of his better games. Again, I’ll refrain from listing the final standings on these two player World Championship matches throughout this article.

1958 CHESS OLYMPIAD
Moving on, Botvinnik played next at the 1958 Olympiad. The Soviet team won (again), and Botvinnik had a decent result, with 10/14, though he suffered a shocking loss in the preliminary stage. While most of his opponents were not at the very top, I found the game below to be impressive. Botvinnik demolishes a strong Grandmaster in only 23 moves… as black.

1959 – 1960   |  WAGENINGEN CALTEX, WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP VS. TAL
Up next on Botvinnik’s schedule was the Wageningen Caltex tournament. This was not an especially strong field, and Botvinnik’s 4/5 was something of a disappointment. After this Botvinnik had another subpar performance. In the Soviet Spartakiad Botvinnik drew all but one game (which he won), but he certainly could have done better.

After a few training games, it was time for the world championship. This time Botvinnik was faced with the legendary young upstart Mikhail Tal. The match was the polar opposite of Botvinnik’s electrifying performance against Smyslov: this time it was Tal who won the first three decisive games. Afterwards Botvinnik bounced back to win two in a row, but Tal again won the next three, and from this point the match was more or less over. It was indeed a very disappointing performance from Botvinnik, with the final score being 12.5-8.5 in Tal’s favor.

While Tal was the better player this time around, I think the below game shows how Botvinnik could highlight Tal’s greatest potential weakness: the fact that he was a reckless attacker.

1960 CHESS OLYMPIAD
Despite his failure at Wageningen, Botvinnik had to represent his country in the Olympiad shortly afterward … but on board 2 this time. As usual the Soviet team won, and Botvinnik again had a strong result, winning the board two prize with an impressive 10.5/13. Nevertheless Botvinnik was not able to face strong opposition often, and when he did those games were mostly drawn.

One of Botvinnik’s stronger games was this effort against GM Ludek Pachman:

1961   |   WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP VS. TAL
Apart from a few training games, Botvinnik’s next challenge was his World Championship rematch against Tal. But this time Botvinnik was facing a different man. Tal was overconfident, and was rightly punished. In the beginning it was an up and down match, but when Botvinnik won three games in a row from games 9-11 the match was more or less decided. A few more wins were traded but Tal was never really in it with a chance, and the final score of 13-8 is one of the worst humiliations in world championship history.

Botvinnik played many good games, but below are some of the highlights:

1961 – 1962   |   STOCKHOLM, HASTINGS 
Next up in the European team championship Botvinnik helped bring his team to victory with a decent +3 result.  While Botvinnik won the Stockholm 1962 tournament (not the Interzonal!), with an incredible 8.5/9, the field was nothing to write home about.

Botvinnik’s next good result in a strong tournament was his 8/9 in the 1961/62 Hastings tournament. While the field was still not up to Botvinnik’s super standards, such a result can be considered a success. Below is his game against fourth place finisher Arthur Bisguier where he won in superb positional style:

And here are the final standings:

1962 CHESS OLYMPIAD
Next up was the 1962 Olympiad. Botvinnik once again led the Soviet team to victory, though in the finals he had a disappointing performance, with only +1. While he had a few strong wins, I would like to present a historically significant face-off: Botvinnik’s only game against his successor Bobby Fischer.

1963   |   WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP VS. TIGRAN PETROSIAN
Up next was Botvinnik’s world championship match against Tigran Petrosian. After 14 games the score was even, but once again a three game winning streak decided the match. Petrosian won the next three decisive games in a row and ended the match.

With this Botvinnik lost the World Champion title for good by a score of 12.5-9.5. While the match was close for awhile, Petrosian closed spectacularly. Nevertheless, Botvinnik got off to a flying start by winning the first game.