Greetings faithful readers! My first blog post is in response to this article on chess.com
Considering the recent 50 year anniversary of the legendary USSR-Rest of the world match, I have decided to review what I consider to be the best games of each round. Enjoy!
ROUND 1
For this round I decided on an impressive squeeze with Fischer winning as white against Petrosian. After black’s mistaken 17th move the problems piled up and Petrosian was unable to hold on.
ROUND 2
For this round I decided on the game Larsen-Spassky, in which Spassky won in a ridiculous 17 moves as black! Larsen played 1.b3 and misplayed the opening. By move 10 white was already close to lost, and soon after the game came to a spectacular close. One of the worst games of Larsen’s career!
ROUND 3
For this round I decided on Tal-Najdorf. Tal won a surprisingly restrained game as white, where out of a sideline in the Taimanov Sicilian black failed to find the most accurate way to equalize out of the opening. After that Mischa squeezed and Najdorf missed one possible chance for salvation in a rook ending, where the tablebase shows an incredible draw where the defending side is down two whole pawns (!) but but no progress can be made. After that Tal simply mops up, and black resigned without bothering to resume.
ROUND 4
For this round I chose the critical game Smyslov-Olaffson. Out of an open Catalan black missed the correct way to equalize and Smyslov gained a small positional advantage. He pressed it home successfully, and by move 30 he was practically winning and no further mistakes were made. A very high quality game by Smyslov played under intense pressure. Let me explain. This game was the last of the entire match to finish, and prior to this game’s end the match was tied 19.5-19.5. Thus this game decided the match in the USSR’s favor!
If there were any games you feel would have been better candidates leave a comment and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks for reading and stay healthy in this time of uncertainty!
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