He was one of those players who needed to dislike his opponent to play at full strength. That may be one reason why he had trouble with Huebner. He didn't hate him. (There was controversy in that match, but for once it wasn't Korchnoi's fault).

(Well, it was the third match if you include their 1974 match......) Need one say more about THAT match?

On the other hand, maybe it's a test of your faith. Maybe he deliberately made no case whatsoever for the idea just to see if your faith in him was strong enough to believe it without any. Maybe he had a secret file containing conclusive proof that he planned to make public once the test of faith was over, and it will still turn up one day.

The first two Karpov-Korchnoi matches were competitive and of high quality and deserve to be better remembered than by the rants a of a deranged genius.

You're right about the Karpov-Korchnoi matches, though. The 1974 match is one of the better matches ever played. Most people don't look at games, only at results. So with this match, they look at those 19 draws and look no further. But if you actually play over the games, you'll see a knock-down dragout match with two people trying to beat each other's heads in game after game after game, and being completely evenly matched.

I think this is the downside of professional sport. When you depend on results to survive, then you don't think about the beauty of sport but money. That's also the reason for quick boring draws in chess, or refusal to play against someone you fear, as happened many times in chess history.

Imagine a baseball team in Russia challenging the World Series winner to a 7 game match and winning say in 5 or 6 games!! I hope I live for the day when Cuban baseball teams play in the Major's. When a certain country dominates an activity year after year, then loses it, it creates havoc within that country!! Personally I'd LOVE to see another country compete and win the World Series. Just to show us how silly we have been calling it the World Series for all these years. When they do, THEN it can properly be titled such.

This must be an achievement in itself, surely?

Btw, who is the person standing at the start of the video?

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I'd be afraid too after looking at karpovs style

http://schachfestival.de/aktuelles....
(scroll down and then click on the picture to enlarge)

Among top players near his age bracket, I think only the puzzling Paul Keres (who like Korchnoi was an Almost World Champion) was able to dominate Viktor the Terrible. In their first 16 games, Keres beat Korchnoi 4 times with no defeats. Korchnoi only managed to win on his 17th and last try when Keres was just a few months from dying of a heart attack in 1975. (Paul Keres beat Viktor Korchnoi 4 to 1, with 12 draws)

I can see your point though, because Karpov was a good twenty years younger than Viktor the terrible. But then you can also claim Fischer was another generation from Korchnoi. Because Fischer was 12 years Korchnoi's junior.

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