Jonathan Sarfati Member since Sep-27-06 · Last seen Apr-08-26 F.M., Ph.D. (physical chemistry), New Zealand Champion 1988, author of eight books and co-author of nine more. See also bio http://creation.com/sarfati. I was club captain of the Wellington Chess Club in New Zealand and Logan City Chess Club in Queensland, Australia for over a decade each. I admire Capablanca and Karpov for the clarity and effectiveness of their styles. I recognize only the lineal world champions as real ones, i.e. those who won their titles by winning a match with the incumbent where available, not the FIDE ones who won silly knock-out tournaments. This means Steinitz, Lasker, Capablanca, Alekhine, Euwe, Botvinnik, Smyslov, Tal, Petrosian, Spassky, Fischer, Karpov, Kasparov, Kramnik, Anand, Carlsen, Ding, and Gukesh. I have a Morphy number of 4: Morphy —> Mortimer —> Tartakover —> Najdorf —> me since I played a drawn blitz game against Najdorf at the 1992 Olympiad, after he had beaten several others in succession.

Jonathan Sarfati has kibitzed 2128 times to chessgames   [more...]

Apr-06-26 Victor (Vytas) Palciauskas   Jonathan Sarfati: <FSR:> that's fair. They were players of different eras. Their wins over Berliner were decades after his peak.      Apr-06-26 J Sarfati vs J Arbuthnott, 1980   Jonathan Sarfati: Not a great game from my youth, although my opponent was generous to me afterwards. Black was doing fine from the opening, and would have been better if he had played 19... h5 to keep lines closed. After that, White was better. 25... gxh6 made things much worse, with White ...      Apr-05-26 V Lushkott vs A Fletcher, 1951    Jonathan Sarfati: Objectively, 5. ♗xf7+ is a bad line for White. Black's ♔ should be safe, and has the ♗-pair and strong ♙-centre. He just has to watch out for traps. E.g., 8... h6 drives back Black's ♘. 9. ♘e4 doesn't work because there is now a luft on ...      Apr-02-26 D Lynch vs R Severinsen, 1961    Jonathan Sarfati: Incomplete score?      Apr-02-26 D Lynch vs R A Rasa, 1952    Jonathan Sarfati: Incomplete score?      Apr-01-26 A Pomeroy vs D Guthrie, 1996   Jonathan Sarfati: Hey Richard. Sorry about the delay in replying. I've now been living in the USA for 15 years, mostly out of competitive OTB play. Semi-retired and working remotely. Glad you are still around.      Dec-05-25 Fischer vs Myagmarsuren, 1967   Jonathan Sarfati: <Bishoprick> Fischer's four losses against Tal were in Tal's prime, just before he took the world title.      Sep-22-25 J Sarfati vs R J Dive, 1991   Jonathan Sarfati: According to Stockfish 17, White had only a tiny advantage up to move 28. 28... ♕e7 allowed a bigger advantage of (+1). Its first choice is 30.h4. SF says Black's best is saccing the exchange with {30... Rxd6. I was concerned about 30...g5, but White would get ...      Sep-21-25 R J Dive vs J Sarfati, 1993   Jonathan Sarfati: Final round game, where my opponent was in line for the title. I was in two minds about winning, after earlier throwing away a much better game to lose to Anthony Ker, the eventual winner, meaning my variable play decided the NZ Champ that year. But the late former champ ...      Sep-21-25 R J Dive vs D Guthrie, 2001   Jonathan Sarfati: 21... e5 looked attractive, but in reality it was too loosening. 26.R×d5 was fatal, e.g., 26...Nxd5 27.Bxh7+ Kf8 28.Qh5 Ra7 29.Bg6 Ke7 30.Nxe4+. The final position is inevitable smothered mate.

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