May 29, 2020 Matthew Sadler No comments existThe next stop for me through my tour of old books about forgotten players was the Latvian Grandmaster Aivars Gipslis (1937-2000) He is one of many names I had heard of without knowing anything concrete about them. He was ranked 19th in the world on the January and July 1971 lists with a rating of…
May 22, 2020 Matthew Sadler 1 commentContinuing my journey through books from Steve Giddins’ collection, I came across a volume of Russian Grandmaster Alexander Zaitsev’s best games. If you know your Karpov games, then his name may ring a bell as he was the Black player in this astonishing position after 18 moves at the 1970 Russian Championship, a game Karpov…
January 21, 2019 Matthew Sadler 3 commentsOne intriguing thing during the match was how much Lasker varied his repertory as Black against 1.d4. The 3 games he played with his own Lasker variation in the Queen’s Gambit Declined (1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 Be7 5.e3 Ne4) netted him 2.5 points out of 3 games and some pretty good positions…
January 10, 2019 Matthew Sadler No comments existAfter winning their first encounter, Frank Marshall had to wait another 40 years to defeat Emanuel Lasker! This game was played 6 months before Lasker’s death at an exhibition match played next to the 1940 US Championship. It was a very interesting game with a fraught tactical episode on the 23rd move. I think that…
July 11, 2018 Matthew Sadler 6 commentsLast weekend was an opportunity for some good practice at the excellent Kings Place rapid tournament (http://chess-results.com/tnr362015.aspx?lan=1&art=1&rd=6&flag=30) After a very busy period at work, I wasn’t in inspired form but did enough to finish =2nd on 5/6 together with GM Luke Mcshane and IM Peter Roberson behind the winner GM David Howell. However, it’s always…