The Kibitzer
by Tim Harding

Thoughts on the Millennium

I warn you, this is not a typical column from The Kibitzer. This
article is largely about the history, and a little about the future,
of chess and its players, and it is prompted by the imminent
dawning of what many believe to be a new Millennium. 

(For those of you reading this article while it is still December
1999, I had better explain that this is the column in my The
Kibitzer series which will be "live" at the Chess Cafe on
January 1, 2000 and therefore I did not want to wait another
month when the topic might seem a bit stale.)

The game of chess is already over a thousand years old; just
how much older is a moot point and we will come to this in a
minute. The modern game that we play today   with the
powerful queen, the double opening move of the pawn and
castling   largely dates from the end of the 15th century, with
some local variations that did not entirely die out until the 20th
century. (See Kibitzer 31 - December 1998 in The Chess Cafe
Archives - for a proposal to revive the old Italian rule of Free
Castling!)

Where and when did chess originate? Some say Persia (Iran),
others India or even China. What does seem clear is that the
dissemination of the game to the West was mainly due to the
Islamic expansion; the Arabs discovered an early form of game
in Persia when they over-ran it in the 640s and they brought
chess with them wherever they went in the middle ages. (The
Persians themselves probably got the game from India during
the sixth century AD and passed it on to the Byzantine empire
as well as to the Arabs.) The modern game evolved much later
in the Renaissance period, especially in Italy and Spain but
spreading rapidly to France, Germany, England and other
European countries with the printing press.

The currently accepted view about the early history of chess is
probably best stated in Chess: The History of A Game by
Richard Eales (Batsford 1985). Professor Eales was a
contemporary on the Cambridge University team of the late
1960s with players such as GM Ray Keene and IM Bill
Hartston and became a professional historian. The first chapter
of his book discussed the question of when was chess invented,
and Eales was (shall we say) cautiously daring about this. 

One sometimes sees claims that (for example) a four-handed
form of chess called chaturanga was played in India as long
ago as 2500BC. See for example the book Chessmen by A.E.J.
Mackett-Beeson (Octopus Books, London 1973. A more
current, and more believable view is that chaturanga had been
invented (or evolved from an earlier game) in India, perhaps
only a few decades before the Arabs got it from the Persians.

Of course it partly counts on what you think qualifies as
"chess". The features that really make chess special are the
variety of pieces with differing powers and limitations, and the
absolute value of the king. Other challenging, or even great,
games such as checkers (draughts) and GO lack these
characteristics. The chequerboard itself is not unique to chess: it
is also used for checkers (8x8 draughts) and may have predated
both games. The move of the knight is a magical symbol of
great antiquity in the orient and may also have predated the
invention of chess.

Eales wisely rejects archaeological 'evidence'. If somebody
digs up something that looks like a chess piece, it may be
carbon-datable but who can prove that it actually anything to do
with a game resembling chess? It is better to rely on written
sources and linguistic evidence. Attempts to relate other early
games in Egypt or Europe, such as the Irish fichille to chess
also seem too far-fetched. The origin of chess has to be sought
in central or eastern Asia.

Of the early cultures associated with chess, only Islam
mentioned chess in literature. From Islamic texts of around the
tenth century AD, whence we have knowledge of the first
named chess champions and recorded games. Some of these
manuscripts incorporate parts of earlier texts, and hence Eales
concluded with some confidence that chess can be traced back
at least to about the year 800, and with slightly less certainty at
least to 728 when a line from an Arabic poet al-Farazdaq (who
died in that year) incorporates the word "baidaq" which,
according to Eales, "has no meaning except that of a pawn in
chess".

Whether chess was actually invented in India, and what form it
took, is much more obscure. The earliest Sanskrit references,
contemporaneous with the earliest Persian references (7th
century) make it clear that the word for the 8x8 chessboard was
"ashtapada" while "chaturanga" was the Sanskrit word for
chess and also meant an army or its formation. The popular idea
that chaturanga was a game for four players seems to have been
based on a misunderstanding or mistranslation: the real
meaning is that the game mirrored the four elements of the
army: the elephant (corresponding to the modern bishop), horse
(knight), chariot (rook = "rukh" in Persian and Arabic) and
foot-soldier (pawn). The king was the king or "shah" while the
precursor of the modern queen was the vizier, counsellor or
"firz".
The moves of the horse and chariot remain unchanged to this
day.

(The term "firz" is the same as the Russian word for the queen
in chess today, and was still in use in Chaucer's time in mid-
14th century England when the poet in his The Book of the
Duchess laments losing this piece in a game of chess.)

Also, the popular idea that early chaturanga involved rolling a
dice to see which piece should be moved is not clearly
supported by evidence. Eales refers to an account of Indian
chess by an Arab observer around the year 1030 that refers to a
four-handed chess game with dice, but there is good reason to
believe (with earlier sources including Murray and Van der
Linde) that this was a variant and that the form of chess
exported from India several hundred years earlier had been a
two-player game. 

Eales then writes cautiously that "If it is so difficult to
reconstruct the history of chess in India after 600, by which
time it had already begun its journey to the West, it must seem
quite impossible to reach any conclusions about the game's
actual invention, before 600". Professor H.J.R. Murray's theory
(in his "A Short History Of Chess", written later than Murray's
main history of the game) that chaturanga was invented by one
individual (whom Murray calls a "philosopher") is generally
regarded as fanciful.

What, however, of the theory that chess was actually invented
in China and transmitted to India, rather than the other way
around? That is a possible topic for a future article and I should
be very interested to hear from any reader who has evidence or
even sound hypotheses bearing on this topic.

The future of chess is impossible to predict: maybe it will die
out soon, maybe it will last (with further mutations) to another
millennium or beyond. Maybe the human race will invent new
games, but in the class of board games the old ones still seem to
hold the greatest fascination. Maybe computers will eventually
exhaust the possibilities of chess so that every home and
personal vehicle will contain a machine that can (among
thousands of other delegated tasks) also beat the human world
chess champion. Or maybe not. 

(I am not talking about blitz games where the top computers are
already king, but games played at a slower pace where the
computer's consultation of openings and endgame databases is
balanced by the human master being allowed to do the same.
This could be both single-session "advanced chess" at a
moderate time limit, and correspondence chess played at the
rate of a move every few days. )

There are several ways in which the conditions for humans and
computers could be equalised in the future. Maybe professional
human masters will go "bionic" and have microchip implants
enabling them to access databases as the same speed as their
electronic opponents. Maybe they will use mind-enhancing
drugs like the hero of The Player of Games, the science-fiction
novel by Iain M. Banks. (So the current debate about drug
testing in chess, highlighted by GM Hans Ree in the latest issue
of New In Chess magazine, may not be so silly after all?)

More simply, a rule might be introduced for chess tournaments
that the only machines allowed to compete are those which are
both:
a) not networked to any larger computer in or outside the
playing hall;
b) capable of physically making their moves on the same board
(and managing the clock) as their human opponents without
assistance. 

This would mean that only robots (androids) capable of
functioning as individuals would be able to play in rated chess
events. There is no reason why FIDE should not bring in that
rule now! However, these are only rules about conditions of
play, not changes to the game itself.

One respondent to Kibitzer 31 pointed out that changing the
rules of chess itself, such as the moves of the pieces, will not
keep the computer threat at bay for very long. Any variant that
became popular would soon be programmed by the commercial
chess computer companies, and it is anyway not so easy to find
a variation that would benefit the humans (for whom their past
knowledge and experience could become largely irrelevant)
more than the computers. I still think that Free castling is a
better idea than the Fischer-style randomised back rank if we
want to go that route. However, I do not foresee a logical
evolution of chess to a more advanced and more satisfying
game to parallel the evolution of whist into contract bridge.

Of course, it is also possible that at some time in the future
mankind will come into contact with another species so
intelligent that they can beat our most powerful computers at
chess unaided. Or perhaps they will introduce to us a game of
their own that is so fascinating that chess becomes as obsolete
as Nine Man's Morris.

I think that chess, in some form, will continue to remain
popular in the foreseeable future   for a few good reasons. It is
a good mental challenge both for adults and children, it lends
itself to study, it has appeal to both solitary and social people, it
transcends language and other barriers, and of course it is
ideally suited to distance play on the Internet.

Because this article is largely philosophical, it includes no
games. To make up for that, I have made a selection of Ten
Influential Games of the Millennium which are available for
download from http://www.chessmail.com/freegames.html in
ChessBase or PGN format. You can find those games also at
the end of this article.

Before we come to that, there is one more topic I want to raise.
I really did not want to get into arguments about whether or not
year 2000 is the first in a new Millennium or the last in the old
one as these have been well rehearsed in other places (e.g. a
book by Stephen Jay Gould). However, taking sides on this
seems inevitable for anyone writing this kind of article. Since I
referred to the imminent Millennium in passing in an editorial
in my Chess Mail magazine, a couple of readers wrote in to say
I was wrong. So I think a few paragraphs on my position are in
order. Just don't expect me to enter into any correspondence
about it!

I accept that there was no year zero AD and that formally there
is another 12 months to go; on the other hand, the people who
set up the Anno Domini system some centuries after the event
were probably a few years out in their dating. Apparently it is
now agreed that there was an astronomical event that could
collate with the Star of Bethlehem story a few years earlier than
the date set for the BC/AD divide. So Jesus Christ, if he was an
historical figure at all, was alive and living in Egypt at the time
when "1BC" gave way to "1AD". 

However, those who argue this means we should only celebrate
a New Year at January 2000 are overlooking two factors which
I think weigh more heavily than mathematical or astronomical
accuracy.

Firstly, there is the question of weight of popular opinion,
which is overwhelmingly (at least in the West) in favour of
celebrating January 1 2000 as a more significant date than
January 1 2001. (OK, so we can have two start-of-the-
Millennium parties; why not?)

OK, it is true that Arthur C. Clarke and Stanley Kubrick set
their famous Space Odyssey film in the year 2001 rather than
2000, but that doesn't constitute a serious argument in this
context. Simply "2001" has a much better artistic ring to it than
"2000".

When I was younger and being educated in Britain, I was
taught that a billion was a million millions, i.e. 10 to the 12th
power (write 1 with twelve zeros after it) but in America, a
billion was held to be 10 to the 9th power (a thousand million)
and what we called a billion was there called a trillion. (A
trillion, according to the 1976 Concise Oxford Dictionary  
which also notes the alternative meanings of these words  
was then defined as a "million million millions", i.e. 1 followed
by eighteen zeros.)

Now, however, I have long given up using the word "billion" in
the old British sense for fear of being misunderstood by a factor
of one thousand. in the year 1999, I think that pretty well
everyone accepts that the American billion has "won".
Similarly, the year 2000 has "won" over 2001 as the start of the
new Millennium. If you really don't think that is logical then I
suggest a compromise: consider it as both the last year of the
old and the first year of the new!

This does not mean that I always bow to the weight of popular
culture but I think it is fairly futile to refuse to celebrate the
Millennium at the end of this month (assuming you are reading
these words in December 1999). Some have pointed out that it
was fairly widely accepted (e.g. in British newspapers of 100
years ago) that January 1, 1900 was a year too early to celebrate
the start of a new century and that many people waited until
January 1, 1901 to do this. In those days, serious academic
opinions probably carried more weight than they do now in
such contexts; moreover, Queen Victoria was still alive and in
many respects the world still looked backward.

However, and here is my second factor, the step from 1899 to
1900, was psychologically far less significant than the step
from 1999 to 2000 will be. The Victorians were only changing
the second digit in every date they had to write: we will have to
change the first. As a young boy in the 1950s, probably like
most people born after World War II ended, I looked forward to
January 1, 2000 as a major life target, a day I wanted to live to
see. When I was in primary school, nobody taught me that there
was no year zero or that Christ was born in 4BC. These
concepts only came my way much later.

Now, however, barring accidents or sudden illness, it seems I
may have a good chance to see the dawning of January 1, 2000.
But what then? What is the new target? Achieving the chess
grandmaster title, perhaps: it's very slightly less impossible for
me than living to January 1, 3000.

At the tolling of the midnight bells we shall all move from the
comfort of the century in which we were born to the certainty
of knowing that we are now in the era in which we   and our
children and our children's children's children...   will die and
be long forgotten.

Against this background, the pessimist may ask, what does it
matter whether we strive for some kind of achievement or just
sit behind a chessboard wasting the time that will soon waste
us? However, one cannot afford to let such an attitude prey on
our minds! So, especially those of us who have passed our half
centuries, we have to set ourselves new goals: and what better
goal than to reach a much higher standard in chess. You don't
want something you can achieve tomorrow, or within a few
months or even a few short years, because then new goals
would have to be found to replace them. 

So FIDE International Master, ICCF (correspondence chess)
Grandmaster, World Veteran's Champion (should I live to
reach the qualifying age of 60): all these targets beckon to me.
My opponents had better watch out!

Appendix: Ten Influential Games of the Millennium

The first game, from one of the oldest chess manuscripts, was
reputedly won by Arab champion as-Suli in the 10th century
AD.

1 g3 g6 2 g4 Pawns could only move one square at a time.
2...f6 3 e3 e6 4 Ne2 d6 5 Rg1 c6 6 f3 b6 7 f4 a6 8 f5 This
opening devised by as-Suli was known as The Torrent: the
white f-pawn disrupts the enemy plans. 8...exf5 9 gxf5 gxf5?
Better 9...g5 to keep his pawn front intact. (See Diagram)

Threatening to capture the f5 pawn. Black is not protecting it
because the elephant can only move two squares, i.e. to e6.
10...Ne7 11 Rf1 Rg8 12 Ng3 Rg5 13 Bxf5 h6 14 Bh3 This
piece is not en prise: the black elephant (bishop) can go to g4
but not h3. 14...Nd7 15 d3 d5 16 c3 Qc7 The firz moved to any
diagonally adjacent square. 17 b3 Ra7 18 c4 The rest of this
game cannot be represented with a chess database because the
black elephants at f8 and c8 leap over the horses to d6 and e6
respectively! However you can play the game through on a real
chess set.18...Bd6 19 Nc3 Be6 20 cxd5 cxd5 21 d4 Bf8 22 Rf2
Qd6 23 b4 Rc7 24 Kd2 b5 25 Ba3 Nb6 26 Bc5 With the major
threat of Bxe7.26...Nc6? According to C.H.O'D. Alexander in
The Book Of Chess, Black is now lost and should have played
26...Nb8 instead.
27 a3 Kf7 28 Qc2 Bc4 29 Raf1 Rg6 30 Nh5 Ke8 31 Nxf6+
Kd8 32 Nfxd5 Rb7 33 Rxf8+ Kd7 34 Bf5+! Ke6 35 Nf4
checkmate. 1 0 (The fil on f5 does not threaten the square e6
but it does cover d7!) 

According to Murray, my second game has been ascribed to
French philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau but was actually
played much earlier, won by a Roman player named il
Busnardo against an unknown opponent some time before
1590. 
1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bc4 Bc5 4 c3 Qe7 5 0 0 d6 6 d4 Bb6 7
Bg5 f6 8 Bh4 g5? 9 Nxg5!? fxg5 10 Qh5+ Kd7 11 Bxg5 Qg7?
(See Diagram)

12 Be6+! Kxe6 13 Qe8+ and 14 d5 mate 1 0

In the third game Philidor, the most famous name in 18th
century chess, waits to the endgame to prove his axiom that
"pawns are the soul of chess".
Count Bruehl - Andre Danican Philidor London, 1783
1 e4 e5 2 Bc4 c6 3 Qe2 d6 4 c3 f5 5 d3 Nf6 6 exf5 Bxf5 7 d4
e4 8 Bg5 d5 9 Bb3 Bd6 10 Nd2 Nbd7 11 h3 h6 12 Be3 Qe7
13 f4 h5 14 c4 a6 15 cxd5 cxd5 16 Qf2 0 0 17 Ne2 b5 18 0 0
Nb6 19 Ng3 g6 20 Rac1 Nc4 21 Nxf5 gxf5 22 Qg3+ Qg7 23
Qxg7+ Kxg7 24 Bxc4 bxc4 25 g3 Rab8 26 b3 Ba3 27 Rc2
cxb3 28 axb3 Rbc8 29 Rxc8 Rxc8 30 Ra1 Bb4 31 Rxa6 Rc3
32 Kf2 Rd3 33 Ra2 Bxd2 34 Rxd2 Rxb3 35 Rc2 (See
Diagram)

Now Philidor plays to create connected passed pawns. 35...h4!?
36 Rc7+ Maybe better to go at once for 36 gxh4 Nh5 (36...Kg6
37 Rc6).36...Kg6 37 gxh4 Nh5 38 Rd7 Nxf4 39 Bxf4 Rf3+ 40
Kg2 Rxf4 41 Rxd5 Rf3 42 Rd8 Rd3 43 d5 f4 44 d6 Rd2+ 45
Kf1 Kf7 46 h5 e3 47 h6 f3 0 1

The gambit introduced in my fourth game was described by
contemporaries as "the gift of the gods to a languishing chess
world".
Captain William D. Evans - Alexander McDonnell London,
1827
1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bc4 Bc5 4 0 0 d6 5 b4! Bxb4 6 c3 Ba5 7
d4 Bg4 8 Qb3 Qd7 9 Ng5 Nd8 10 dxe5 dxe5 11 Ba3 Nh6 12
f3 Bb6+ 13 Kh1 Bh5 14 Rd1 Qc8 (See Diagram)

15 Rxd8+ Qxd8 16 Nxf7 Qh4 17 Qb5+ c6 18 Qxe5+ Kd7 19
Qe6+ Kc7 20 Bd6 mate 1 0

My fifth game effectively the settled the match between the two
top players of the mid-19th century. Morphy had a brief career
but was enormously influential on Steinitz.
Paul Morphy - Adolf Anderssen Paris, 7th match game, 1858
1 e4 d5 2 exd5 Qxd5 3 Nc3 Qa5 4 d4 e5 5 dxe5 Qxe5+ 6 Be2
Bb4 7 Nf3 Bxc3+ 8 bxc3 Qxc3+ 9 Bd2 Qc5 10 Rb1 Nc6 11
0 0 Nf6 12 Bf4 0 0 13 Bxc7 Nd4 14 Qxd4 Qxc7 15 Bd3 Bg4
16 Ng5 Rfd8 17 Qb4 Bc8 18 Rfe1 a5 (See Diagram)

19 Qe7! Qxe7 If 19...Rd7 20 Qe8+ Nxe8 21 Rxe8# so Black
loses at least a pawn whatever he does. 20 Rxe7 Nd5 21 Bxh7+
Kh8 22 Rxf7 Nc3 23 Re1 Nxa2 24 Rf4 Ra6 25 Bd3 1 0

My sixth choice was the psychologically decisive game in the
world title match between the great but dogmatic chess
pedagogue and the exponent of the "philosophy of struggle", Dr
Lasker.
Siegbert Tarrasch - Emanuel Lasker 4th match game,
Duesseldorf 1908
1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 Nf6 4 0 0 d6 5 d4 Bd7 6 Nc3 Be7 7
Re1 exd4 8 Nxd4 Nxd4 9 Qxd4 Bxb5 10 Nxb5 0 0 11 Bg5 h6
12 Bh4 Re8 13 Rad1 Nd7 14 Bxe7 Rxe7 15 Qc3 
(See Diagram)

Tarrasch has achieved a slight positional advantage and
probably felt in his element so Lasker switched to provocation
mode with a famous, but objectively very risky, rook
manoeuvre. 15...Re5!? 16 Nd4 Rc5 17 Qb3 Nb6 18 f4 Now
there is no way back, but Lasker has no intention of
withdrawing his advanced rook. 18...Qf6 19 Qf3 Re8 20 c3 a5
21 b3 a4 22 b4?!
22 c4! is better 22...axb3 23 axb3 c6 24 Nf5 d5 25 Qf2 Nd7 26
g4! according to Kasparov.
22...Rc4 23 g3 Rd8 24 Re3 c5 25 Nb5? Tarrasch has lost most,
if not all, of his advantage but still dreams of victory, pursuing
a mirage to "punish" his opponent's "incorrect" play. Better 25
bxc5 Rxc5 26 Rb1 Nc4 27 Rd3=. 25...cxb4 26 Rxd6 Rxd6 27
e5 (See Diagram)

27...Rxf4! The despised rook lands the death-blow. 28 gxf4
Qg6+ 29 Kh1 Qb1+ 30 Kg2 Rd2+ 31 Re2 Qxa2 32 Rxd2
Qxd2+ 33 Kg3 a3 34 e6 Qe1+ 35 Kg4 Qxe6+ 36 f5 Qc4+ 37
Nd4 a2 38 Qd1 Nd5 39 Qa4 Nxc3 40 Qe8+ Kh7 41 Kh5 a1Q
0 1 Tarrasch resigned somewhat belatedly, and never
recovered. In spirit, a true 20th century game.

My 7th game is a clash between world champions past and
future.
Mikhail Botvinnik - Jose Raul Capablanca AVRO, 1938
1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 Bb4 4 e3 d5 5 a3 Bxc3+ 6 bxc3 c5 7
cxd5 exd5 8 Bd3 0 0 9 Ne2 b6 10 0 0 Ba6 11 Bxa6 Nxa6 12
Bb2 Qd7 13 a4 Rfe8 14 Qd3 c4 15 Qc2 Nb8 16 Rae1 Nc6 17
Ng3 Na5 18 f3 Nb3 19 e4 Qxa4 20 e5 In return for the
sacrificed a-pawn, White obtains a very powerful kingside
attack. 20...Nd7 21 Qf2 g6 22 f4 f5 23 exf6 Nxf6 24 f5 Rxe1
25 Rxe1 Re8 26 Re6 Rxe6 27 fxe6 Kg7 28 Qf4 Qe8 29 Qe5
Qe7 (See Diagram)

After he lost the world championship, Botvinnik became
absorbed in his computer chess project which never came to
fruition. In a monograph he tried to show how a computer could
find the following brilliant combination. Probably most GMs
would like to be able to prove that a computer could NOT
match their greatest moments of inspiration. 30 Ba3!! The
bishop is given up for a tempo, just long enough to crack open
the black king's stronghold. However that is only half the
combination: Botvinnik also had to see that "helping" the black
queen to advance did not allow it to give perpetual check.
30...Qxa3 31 Nh5+ gxh5 32 Qg5+ Kf8 33 Qxf6+ Kg8 34 e7
Botvinnik is a knight and pawn down but his passed pawn is
unstoppable. So how does he escape the checks? 34...Qc1+ 35
Kf2 Qc2+ 36 Kg3 Qd3+ 37 Kh4 Qe4+ 38 Kxh5 Qe2+ 39
Kh4 Qe4+ 40 g4 Qe1+ 41 Kh5 1 0.

Short draws are not always dull. My eight game was a real
clash of the titans.
Robert J. Fischer - Mikhail Tal Leipzig olympiad, 1960
1 e4 e6 2 d4 d5 3 Nc3 Bb4 4 e5 c5 5 a3 Ba5!? Tal prepared
this immensely complicated line specially for this game with
his trainer, Alexander Koblents. 6 b4 cxd4 7 Qg4 Ne7 8 bxa5
dxc3 9 Qxg7 Rg8 10 Qxh7 Nbc6! Tal improves on a 1954
world title match game between Smyslov and Botvinnik. 11
Nf3 Qc7 12 Bb5!? Bd7 "Now both White's g-pawn, which
Black seriously threatens to capture, and his e-pawn are
attacked. After lengthy reflection Fischer decided to give up his
central pawn." (Tal, 1976). 13 0 0 0 0 0 (See Diagram)

Tal called this the "most critical moment of the game" and
spent about 40 minutes in thought. 13...Nxe5!? was the major
alternative. Analysts still argue about whether White could
claim an advantage against it.14 Bg5 Later Fischer claimed that
he missed a win by 14 Bxc6 Bxc6 15 Qxf7 but at the time he
thought the move he actually played was also winning.
14...Nxe5 
"I thought Tal was merely trying to confuse the issue." (Fischer
1969) 15 Nxe5 Bxb5!= Amazingly, this is good for equality. 16
Nxf7 Bxf1 17 Nxd8 Rxg5 18 Nxe6 (See Diagram)

Now Black forces perpetual check: 18...Rxg2+ 19 Kh1 Qe5 20
Rxf1 Qxe6 21 Kxg2 Qg4+ « «.

Few observers thought that Petrosian, who had a reputation for
negative and unambitious play in tournaments, would retain the
title he had won in 1963. However he proved yet again what a
great tactician he was.
Tigran Petrosian - Boris Spassky Moscow, world
championship, 10th game, 1966
1 Nf3 Nf6 2 g3 g6 3 c4 Bg7 4 Bg2 0 0 5 0 0 Nc6 6 Nc3 d6 7
d4 a6 8 d5 Na5 9 Nd2 c5 10 Qc2 e5 11 b3 Ng4 12 e4 f5 13
exf5 gxf5 14 Nd1 b5 15 f3?! Petrosian plays provocatively. He
was ahead in the match and Spassky is being tempted to play
for a win. 15...e4 16 Bb2 exf3 17 Bxf3 Bxb2 18 Qxb2 Ne5 19
Be2 f4?! Starting the wrong plan; 19...Ra7 is correct to bring
this piece into play. 20 gxf4 Bh3? (See Diagram)

Petrosian's play so far has not been impressive objectively.
After the correct 20...Rxf4 (21 Rxf4? Qg5+) Black stands OK
but White would probably have found a way to draw. 
Spassky thinks he has a kingside attack but with a brilliant
double sacrifice of the exchange, Petrosian shows whose king is
really in danger. 21 Ne3! Bxf1 22 Rxf1 Ng6 23 Bg4 (See
Diagram)

Now Spassky compounds his misjudgment with a serious
miscalculation, but his position was already difficult.
23...Nxf4? 24 Rxf4! Rxf4 25 Be6+ Rf7 26 Ne4 Qh4 27 Nxd6
Qg5+ 28 Kh1 Raa7 29 Bxf7+ Rxf7 30 Qh8+! 1 0. After
30...Kxh8 31 Nxf7+ Kg7 32 Nxg5 Black is a knight down.

My tenth game is the one that won Kasparov the world title.
Anatoly Karpov - Gary KasparovMoscow, world
championship, 24th game, 1985 
1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 a6 6 Be2 e6 7
0 0 Be7 8 f4 0 0 9 Kh1 Qc7 10 a4 Nc6 11 Be3 Re8 12 Bf3
Rb8 13 Qd2 Bd7 14 Nb3 b6 15 g4 Bc8 16 g5 Nd7 17 Qf2 Bf8
18 Bg2 Bb7 19 Rad1 g6 20 Bc1 Rbc8 21 Rd3 Nb4 22 Rh3
Bg7 23 Be3 Re7 24 Kg1 
(See Diagram)

24...Rce8! An inspired idea. Nimzowitsch wrote of the
mysterious rook move, putting a rook on a closed file which the
opponent wants to open, but Kasparov actually doubles rooks
on a closed file. 25 Rd1 f5 26 gxf6 Nxf6 27 Rg3 Rf7 28 Bxb6
Qb8 29 Be3 Nh5 30 Rg4 Nf6 31 Rh4 Normally White would
settle for a draw by Rg3 but Karpov, 11 12 down in the match,
had to win to remain world champion. 31...g5! (See Diagram)

Black is now winning but Karpov, in time trouble, makes it a
bit easier than he need have done. 32 fxg5 Ng4 33 Qd2 Nxe3
34 Qxe3 Nxc2 35 Qb6 Ba8 36 Rxd6? Rb7 37 Qxa6 Rxb3 38
Rxe6 Rxb2 39 Qc4 Kh8 40 e5? A final blunder with the flag
hanging. 40...Qa7+ 41 Kh1 Bxg2+ 42 Kxg2 Nd4+ 0 1
