Did Tal beat Adamski?
Submitted by
chessbibliophile on Mon, 11/16/2009 at 8:31pm.
Mikhail Tal shunned unpleasantness and abhorred controversies. In his brief life he made no enemies. There was one exception, Jan Adamski, a leading player of Poland.
The dispute between the two shows how the tension of the game can affect the mildest of men. Here we have only Tal’s version of what happened, but not Adamski’s. That makes the story rather one-sided. Nevertheless, it is interesting.
In 1974 Tal was participating in an international tournament in Lublin, Poland. He was in form and played quite a few sparkling games. Trouble arose only in the Adamski game. According to Tal his opponent very much wanted to draw, and even asked him before the game not to ‘torment’ him should they reach an equal ending. During the game again he offered a draw.Tal was annoyed, instantly declined it and straight away left a pawn en prise.Both ended up in terrible time scramble. Adamski gave up recording round about move 25, and Tal-some five moves later. At some point Tal could have forced a draw, but overlooked it, and on his 39th move left a piece en prise. Adamski made his move, and Tal saw that it was time to resign. All the same he made one more move, and Adamski’s flag fell. There was a controller standing by, and he said nothing. So Tal assumed that 40 moves must have been made. As he held out his hand in resignation, he suddenly heard the voice of his wife, speaking in Latvian, “Have you made up some new rules or something? After all, he’s lost on time!” Tal replied in Russian, there was a controller to see all that, but she held up the fingers of both hands; she had been counting Tal’s moves.At her instance Tal reconstructed the score, and found, Black had not managed to make his 40th move. However, Adamski was not going to take all this lying down. He took Tal’s score sheet, rewrote it, and claimed, he had made 42 moves. Soon it turned out that he had simply added a repetition of moves. The controller confirmed that there was no repetition. This did not satisfy Adamski. So the matter was referred to the Appeals Committee. It conducted an inquiry, taking statements from the parties concerned and also witnesses watching the game. Finally, it concluded, there had been no repetition, and Adamski had, indeed, lost on time.
He was upset and complained a great deal. Much was written about it in the Polish press. After all, he was their compatriot. The episode had a curious aftermath. Adamski annotated the game for The Chess Player. There he gave the game score with 42 moves. In his autobiography, The Life and Games of Mikhail Tal, Tal says he was only amused by this falsification of fact. At this rate even he could show one of his simultaneous games, and claim that a certain Adamski had lost to him.
This brings us to the game, and you can see for yourself how close Adamski was to victory.
But the game is not over.How can Adamski withstand Tal's onslaught here?
"At least now Black should win." Sure, how is he going to do that here?
So what happens next? With his flag hanging, Tal blunders next.Could you find his salvation here?
A tragicomedy that deserved a better fate and not a bitter aftermath.
Courtesy: Chess Mate Magazine, India
Notes:
1)There is not much information on Jan Adamski in English.
But if you look up the Polish page of Wikipedia you would get more particulars.
There is a good link to games: http://www.365chess.com/players/Jan_Adamski
2)There is no lack of information on Tal.
I can offer my own collection of links
Do not miss the interviews with his first wife, Sally and the daughter, Zenna.
The lady who figures in the present article is his second wife.Zenna is her daughter.
http://www.chess.com/article/view/remembering-tal2
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