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| Jul-12-03 | | Benjamin Lau: Ulf Andersson was feared for his suffocating positional grasp on his opponents. Like Petrosian, he slowly grinded opponents, reducing their options in chess to mediocrity. He is quite famous for his mastery of the Reti System and rarely loses with it. He has beaten very skilled players like Leko and Larsen with his fabled Reti System. A must study for players who want to adopt the opening. |
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| Jul-13-03 | | JGD: Yes, I have always liked Andersson and adopt the Reti System frequently. Andersson was a master at retreating his pieces to form interesting fortresses. |
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| Jul-17-03 | | MCTREZE: I was studying a variation of the sicilian and i got some of his games because it's said that he was good with that opening too. |
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| Aug-05-03 | | PVS: A laid back style and a laid back career. He was good enough to play first board in the 1984 USSR vs. the World match. At some point he dropped out of the world championship cycle and finally turned to correspondence chess. |
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| Aug-05-03 | | PVS: 27 June 2003 Birthday article
Swedish GM Ulf Andersson, one of the main hopes of Western chess under the reign of twelfth world champion Anatoly Karpov, celebrates his 52nd birthday today. He achieved his best tournament results in the later 1970s and early 1980s. Ulf’s trademarked style (his manner of arranging pieces on the first three ranks became proverbial) was congruous with the dominating tournament tendency of that time – safe, solid play, "with draw in hand". Even a small plus score offered fair chances for a high, even first place, in the final standings. Besides, the seemingly inexpressive, passive and insipid style of the Swede often provoked his opponents to impulsive and hasty actions. Ulf has always been ruthless in such situations. By using this tactic, Andersson tied for first with Karpov in London and Turin (1982). Owing to his stable results and consistency, Ulf found himself among the top five GMs. Unsurprisingly, the Sweden GM was detached to uphold the honor of the Rest of the World team in the second match with the USSR team of 1984. Unfortunately, Ulf did not have much luck in the world championship cycles. In 1979, being in his prime, Andersson preferred to assist his friend Jan Timman in Rio de Janeiro instead of making his own interzonal attempt. Who know, maybe Ulf thought that he had plenty of time ahead of him? Andersson came very close to success in the Moscow Interzonal (1982). Everything was going fine, but the defeat by Geller foiled Ulf’s plan. Facing the eventual winner of the event and future thirteenth World Champion, the Swedish GM did not have the nerve to dive into a real fight in a favorable position… I can’t get rid of the impression that Andersson could have achieved much more, considering the scope of his talent. There are not many GMs eulogized by several World Champions. Ulf is known for his keen positional understanding and excellent technique. He was even jokingly called the world champion in chess without queens. Garry Kasparov compared him to a pianist-virtuoso, referring to his ability to arrange pieces on the best squares. Probably Ulf missed some fighting spirit, strong will, must-win determination, and the ability to run risks after all. Andersson keeps playing in various events, maintaining a good rating. He is still very hard to beat. Now and then Ulf pleases chess fans with a brilliant displays of his trademarked endgame technique. Career tournament wins: Buenos Aires (1978), Hastings (1978, 1980), Johannesburg (1981), Wijk aan Zee (1983), Rome (1985), San Paulo (1986) Ter Apel (1996), Kottnauer memorial (1996), Bar (1997), Pinamar Masters (2001). Copengagen (1995), Yopal (1997), Dortmund (1999), Dortmund (qualifying, 2002). Professional rating - 2510
FIDE rating - 2594 |
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| Aug-29-03 | | fred lennox: The spirit of ancient chess in Old India comes alive in his games when time and ego were submerged with a feeling of oneness with the universe. |
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| Aug-30-03 | | Ribeiro: <PVS> Very good article! It is curious, the good site http://www.brasilbase.pro.br states that Andersson won an international tournament played in Rio de Janeiro (http://www.brasilbase.pro.br/tb1985...) and has no records of São Paulo, 1986. Does anybody know where and when this tournament took place? |
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| Aug-30-03 | | Larsker: A couple of pictures of Sweden's finest chessplayer:
Against Larsen:
http://www.skgiessen.de/siegen/la.jpg
Against Karpov: http://chess.alfabank.ru/en/london/... |
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| Nov-29-03 | | PinkPanther: My God! Look at how many draws this guy has. He makes Vladimir Kramnik look like Paul Morphy or something. |
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| Jan-06-04 | | waddayaplay: He gave a few interviews at a simul he played in Sweden on the 11th February 2003.
http://hem.bredband.net/b143514/sim...
Its in swedish. Lots of pictures though.
In high school, he was interested in tennis & soccer, besides chesss. After high school, he got a job offer at a local factory, but before he started there he played in the national chamionship '69, which he won, and he got 5th place at Junior wc. After that he started playing for real.... So he has a totally different background than e.g. Karpov (whom he has a very bad record against) and others who got professional training in the botvinnik school of chess. |
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| Jan-06-04 | | OneBadDog: Andersson, Nunn, Korchnoi and Huebner all played in Johanessburg in the early 80s while apartheid was in effect. Did any of these players ever provide a reason for playing there during that time? |
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| Jan-06-04 | | PinkPanther: <Andersson, Nunn, Korchnoi and Huebner all played in Johanessburg in the early 80s while apartheid was in effect. Did any of these players ever provide a reason for playing there during that time?> Well, Korchnoi's an Aries if that has anything to do with anything, lol. No, in reality I don't know. |
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| Jan-06-04 | | Marnoff Mirlony: Unbelievable amount of Draws. |
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| Feb-02-04 | | Benjamin Lau: Andersson has the highest correspondence rating; according to Ughaibu, he has never lost a postal game. That's unbelievable. His positional insight into the game must be immense. |
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| Feb-02-04 | | ughaibu: They reckon the closest he's come to losing was a game with Hamarat. Hamarat had two knights and two connected pawns, Andersson had two knights. Hamarat said he analysed for one move with his king on d3 instead of e3 and consquently made a blunder. I'll upload the game. |
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| Feb-02-04 | | Benjamin Lau: That's an interesting story and I guess it's to be expected since Andersson is so old in comparison to Hamarat. |
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| Feb-02-04 | | TrueFiendish: It would have been interesting if he'd managed to sac his knights for the pawns and drawn it that way. |
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| Feb-02-04 | | ughaibu: TrueFiendish: That's what happened, Hamarat's "blunder" was to allow Andersson to set up his knights such that the sacrifices were unavoidable. |
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| Feb-13-04 | | ughaibu: Benjamin Lau: Andersson has never played in the world championship. His rating comes from playing first board for Sweden in the 12th Olympiad and by participating in "two other very strong ICCF invitational tournaments", I dont know if he won those tournaments. |
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| Feb-13-04 | | Benjamin Lau: He probably did win them, how otherwise could one amass as high a rating as he did in correspondence chess (he seems to be an infrequent player)? Is his rating the highest ever (a record), or the highest currently? |
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| Feb-13-04 | | Benjamin Lau: Btw ughaibu, can you call me BL or maybe Ben? It really irks me for some reason when someone calls me by my full name, it just doesn't seem very natural. I probably should not have used my full name as a handle, it's very cumbersome. <chessgames.com>
Is there anyway you can change your handle or is it permanent? |
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| Feb-13-04 | | S4NKT: Never losing in a correspondence game is quite an amazing feat. It's a shame Ulf wasn't world champion for just a 1 year or so like Tal so his name would be more noticed in chess history, he was afterall one of the top 5 in the world at one point. I guess the next hope for a scandinavian champion is Magnus Carlsen. On another topic... I'm wondering how ELO ratings are compared from country to country? I mean, If I played chess in a nation with strong chess players, let's just take Sweden as an example since this is Ulf's room, and I achieved a rating of 1900, and then I moved to another nation with weaker chess players and joined a club there, let's say.. i don't now.. Egypt.. wouldn't my rating rise a couple hundred points? |
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| Feb-13-04 | | ughaibu: Benjamin: That's fine with me, I tend to use full names on the internet to avoid any possible ambiguity. His rating is presently the highest but I dont know about historically. I uploaded the Hamarat game but it's still percolating through. There was a problem that the game was undated (it probably lasted a few years) which went beyond the uploader's flexibility (I guessed a year). |
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| Feb-13-04 | | S4NKT: Hm in the '82 interzonal he took fourth place, with kasparov at first. |
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| Feb-13-04 | | Benjamin Lau: Thanks ughaibu, btw, you make an interesting point. That could possibly mean that the Estrin v.s. Berliner game as well as some of the other postal games have misleading dates (I believe the Estrin v.s. Berliner game for example lasted 3 years?) S4NKT: You mean as in rise *immediately?* No, it's not like international currency exchanging or at least I don't think it is. You would probably have to play some similarly rated but actually weaker players to get your rating up. It's geographic disparities like this that cause me to view Fischer's rating with a somewhat skeptical view. Since he lived in the U.S. (a relatively weak country in chess), his rating may be "inflated" in comparison to players living in the former USSR for instance. Honza tells us on another page that he's noticed from playing far away players that they generally are overrated (Honza lives in Czech). His analysis in this forum indicates that he is much better than his rating suggests. He often outperforms similarly rated players from the U.S. in his variations. If he had played in the U.S., I bet that his peak rating would have been maybe 2250 instead of a little under 2100. |
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