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Mikhail Tal

MIKHAIL TAL (born Nov-09-1936, died Jun-28-1992, 55 years old) Latvia PRONUNCIATION: [what is this?] Mikhail Nekhemievich Tal was born in Riga, Latvia (annexed by the USSR in 1940). At six, he learned chess from his father, a medical doctor (source: Tal interview in <Chess Life>, May 1967). Tal won his first Latvian Championship in 1953, and earned the title of Soviet Master the following year. In 1957, aged twenty, he became the youngest-ever Soviet Champion. In 1960, following a string of victories in strong tournaments (including a second consecutive Soviet Championship, the Portorož Interzonal and the Candidates in Yugoslavia), Tal became the youngest World Chess Champion with a match victory over Mikhail Botvinnik. This record was broken by Garry Kasparov in 1985. Suffering from poor health, Tal lost the rematch with Botvinnik in 1961. He never qualified for a title match again. Tal continued to struggle with health problems for the rest of his career, which was often marked by inconsistent results. On a number of occasions, however, he was still able to achieve world-class successes. Tal added four more Soviet Championship victories to his resume (in 1967, 1972, 1974, and 1978), equalling Botvinnik's all-time record of six. In 1979, he won joint first place at Montreal with Anatoly Karpov, briefly climbing back to second place in the world rankings and becoming only the third player after Fischer and Karpov to reach a rating of 2700.* In 1988, Tal won the World Blitz Championship. He died of renal failure in 1992 at age 55. Paul Keres was a font of inspiration for him and Tal won three Keres Memorials: 1977, 1981, and 1983. Renowned for his aggressive, sacrificial playing style, Tal was also a noted chess journalist and author. In his autobiography, The Life and Games of Mikhail Tal, he annotates 100 of his greatest games. A list of books about Tal can be found at http://www.chesshistory.com/winter/... Wikipedia article: Mikhail Tal A chronological list of Tal's Tournaments and Matches 1949-1973: Game Collection: Tal's Tournament and Matches 1949-1973 * http://www.olimpbase.org/Elo/Elo198... Last updated: 2021-06-28 21:06:43

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page 1 of 119; games 1-25 of 2,957  Game   Result Moves Year Event/Locale Opening 1. A Parnas vs Tal 0-1 33 1949 URS U18 Team-ch Semifinal C91 Ruy Lopez, Closed 2. Tal vs I Zilber 1-0 33 1949 Riga Pioneer Palace Championship C07 French, Tarrasch 3. Tal vs Vedrov 1-0 65 1949 URS B40 Sicilian 4. J Klavins vs Tal 0-1 18 1949 Riga Junior-ch Final C10 French 5. A Nevitsky vs Tal 0-1 43 1949 Semi Finals Youth Championship C49 Four Knights 6. Tal vs A Vilup   0-1 59 1949 Ch URS (team)(juniors 1/2) C03 French, Tarrasch 7. Tal vs M Strelkov 1-0 16 1949 Riga Junior-ch Final C10 French 8. Mendeleevsky vs Tal   1-0 39 1949 Ch URS (team)(juniors 1/2) D46 Queen's Gambit Declined Semi-Slav 9. Tal vs Leonov 1-0 25 1949 Riga Junior-ch Semifinal B13 Caro-Kann, Exchange 10. Tal vs Ripatti ½-½ 41 1949 URS U18 Team-ch Semifinal B74 Sicilian, Dragon, Classical 11. Butvit vs Tal   0-1 37 1949 Riga C01 French, Exchange 12. Kholmov vs Tal 0-1 21 1949 Simul D44 Queen's Gambit Declined Semi-Slav 13. Tal vs I Miglans 1-0 21 1950 Latvian Youth Championship C82 Ruy Lopez, Open 14. Juliks vs Tal 0-1 39 1950 Riga Championship semifinal A16 English 15. Tal vs Sodell 0-1 23 1950 URS C91 Ruy Lopez, Closed 16. Liepins vs Tal 0-1 44 1950 Riga Team Championship B59 Sicilian, Boleslavsky Variation, 7.Nb3 17. Tal vs A Darznieks 0-1 26 1950 Riga Championship semifinal C98 Ruy Lopez, Closed, Chigorin 18. A Pakalns vs Tal 0-1 29 1950 Riga Championship semifinal D02 Queen's Pawn Game 19. K Klasups vs Tal ½-½ 41 1950 Riga Championship semifinal D30 Queen's Gambit Declined 20. Tal vs J Klavins 1-0 54 1950 Latvian Youth Championship B74 Sicilian, Dragon, Classical 21. Lavrinenko vs Tal 0-1 38 1950 Riga-ch Final B59 Sicilian, Boleslavsky Variation, 7.Nb3 22. Leonov vs Tal 0-1 34 1950 URS E17 Queen's Indian 23. Tal vs M Straihers 1-0 6 1950 Riga Championship semifinal B00 Uncommon King's Pawn Opening 24. V Ivanovs vs Tal 1-0 25 1950 URS C90 Ruy Lopez, Closed 25. Tal vs Pliss 1-0 37 1950 Riga Championship quarterfinal C99 Ruy Lopez, Closed, Chigorin, 12...cd  page 1 of 119; games 1-25 of 2,957

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< Earlier Kibitzing  · PAGE 14 OF 116 ·  Later Kibitzing> Oct-18-04    Giancarlo: Tal was underrated for his time IMO. I think people didn't really think he could amount to beat Botvinnik, and he did. Oct-18-04    Knight13: I bet it was hard for Tal to tie with Karpov. Oct-18-04    Chessical: What surely matters is the creative heritage of players such as Tal, rather than a score on any indices. Oct-18-04    uzeromay: Tal's legacy was somewhat vindicated today as Kramnik used the same opening to defeat Leko that Tal lost to Botvinnik in a world championship match. Oct-19-04    Lawrence: Isn't it Botvinnik who was vindicated? Oct-19-04    marekg248: Yesterday I looked over games from the 1961 Tal-Botvinnik match and I found two games with the move order used yesterday, i.e. 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 ♗f5 4.h4. Tal lost one and the second was a draw, so he would surely be glad to see Kramnik-Leko game, at least as much as I am. 8D Oct-19-04    uzeromay: Tal vs Botvinnik, 1961 Tal vs Botvinnik, 1961 Tal vs Botvinnik, 1961 Tal vs Botvinnik, 1961 These, I believe, are the games to which I refer. Tal played the same 4. h4 move Kramnik played in his final game to defeat Leko. We shall perhaps hear in an interview with Kramnik later as to whether Kramnik was specifically inspired by Tal's performance. Oct-20-04    marekg248: Yes, exactly, and I found the fifth game with 4...c5. So two losses for Tal and 3 draws. Tal vs Botvinnik, 1961 Oct-20-04    Giancarlo: 1961 wasn't exactly a "healthy" year for Tal. But all credit to Botvinnik, he truly studied his Home work for the match. Still I think it was quite a feat for Tal to continue winning games in that WCC. He won 5, lost 10. Atleast he never completly gave up. He fought hard. Oct-22-04    Knight13: In the Book "Tactics and Strategy" by Graham Burgess, it says that Tal was a master attacker at chess. I believe it. I like this player because I am a attacker, too. Oct-22-04    OneArmedScissor: Tal also played the Dutch Defense. I like Tal's Nimzo-Inidan games. Oct-22-04    Spassky69: <Anyway, Spassky69 is wrong> How am I wrong? I said that world champions back then could beat world champions this era I didn't say what time control they would be using. Oct-22-04    Minor Piece Activity: Fine if you want that technicality, but that doesn't excuse the other errors with Spassky and Petrosian. I'd still like to know where you get your 100 point estimate. Oct-28-04    Knight13: Check it out this game: Tal vs Short, 1987. It's amazing how Tal attacked Short's king! Nov-10-04    aw1988: Oh, that's an amazing quote. "There are two types of sacrifices: correct ones and mine." :) Now proceed calling me a freak for always checking the quote of the day. Nov-10-04    tpstar: Tal sacrifices More often correct than not Party on, ya freak Nov-13-04    acirce: <It was a golden age of chess journalism with all those writings about 'an ultimate clash' between 'iron logic', represented by Botvinnik, and 'diabolical tactical trickery', as shown by Tal. It appealed well to the generally well-educated masses of chess fans in the Soviet Union, who needed a little poetic flavour - describing a chess game as an intellectual duel - to keep fuelling their interest in sparsely played World Championship Matches between Soviet grandmasters. Their sympathies were more or less evenly spread between the two players. Even some 15 years later, the Botvinnik-Tal controversy didn't seem to be dying out. Indeed, it represented a mystery: the first match saw Botvinnik losing by 4 points, and the next year he came back, winning by an even larger margin. Serious books had been written on the subject, with in-depth analysis of the players' respective styles done by the best chess journalists the Soviet Union ever produced. I considered myself a good enough chess-player to form my own opinion on the subject. Surely I wasn't going to take any crap from sportswriters, and one day I sat down to look at the games myself. Luckily, the books also contained the game scores from both matches. I thought of something along the lines of tracking the widely announced differences between the players' styles. I expected to see wild attacks and numerous sacrifices from Tal in one game, and deep strategic plans relentlessly implemented by Botvinnik in another. Before I could do any deep analysis I was disappointed. The difference in style didn't show as much as I expected! Tal, the tactician, was well aware of the positional principles listed in the books. Botvinnik, the strategist, went for tactical solutions very often. The two bashed at each other any way they could, with Tal winning the most in the first match, and Botvinnik getting the better of it in the return match. I couldn't see where the difference between them lay, except for Tal being the aggressor early and more often. Go figure. I began to suspect that I, along with thousands of others, had been led to believe in something that didn't exist. Or maybe, such thing as style of play does exist, but on some higher level of the decision-making process that is lurking in the background only to surface in critical moments of a battle. I, at my superficial glance, of course wasn't able to detect it. The truth is, a chess-player's main objective is to find good moves, and the last thing he should worry about is attaching them to his (or, worse, someone else's) theoretical beliefs. In retrospect it's nice to attribute your success to superior 'understanding' or 'class', but it doesn't relieve chess-players from sweating it out on every move. While it's possible to distinguish between positional and combinative play, I wouldn't put one ahead of the other, and here I disagree with the great maestro Mikhail Botvinnik.> Alex Yermolinsky, "The Road to Chess Improvement" Nov-13-04    MoonlitKnight: I read Yermolinsky's book, and I thought it was an overrated pile of rubbish. Nov-13-04    acirce: Yeah, on the whole it is overrated, but some parts I found useful. Luckily I didn't have to pay for it but borrowed it at the library -- otherwise I would have wasted my money on the bad parts :) Nov-13-04    tamar: Not a perfect book but one I got a kick out of because Yermo is such a contrarian. <Surely I wasn't going to take any crap from sportswriters, and one day I sat down to look at the games myself.> I love that attitude. Nov-13-04    chesscookie: was he a world champion? Nov-13-04    Eatman: <chesscookie> if you mean Tal then yes he was the 8th World champion 1960-1961. He was 23 years old when he become WC. If his kidneys were not giving him trouble in 1961 match or if the match had been postponed, Tal could have done better at the rematch. Nov-13-04    chesscookie: <Eatman> Thanks. Nov-14-04    MoonlitKnight: <acirce> Me neither, I won it! :-) Nov-14-04    Phoenix: I loved Yermo's book. You are probably reacting to the "American" talk in it :-) It's lively instead of the usual worthless boring a(2+c) variation-loaded-commentless piece of crap most books are today. Just mho. Jump to page #   (enter # from 1 to 116) search thread:    < Earlier Kibitzing  · PAGE 14 OF 116 ·  Later Kibitzing>

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