Morphy vs. Anderssen

Submitted by likesforests on Thu, 11/01/2007 at 11:51pm.

Their shortest game and a dazzling tactical battle, annotated.

Morphy said to me, "I have a positive chess fever coming over me. Give me the board and the pieces and I'll show you some of Anderssen's games." And with astounding memory, he gave me battle after battle with different adversaries, variations and all. How he dilated on a certain game between him and Drufresne. "There," said Morphy, "That shows the master." -- Paul Meets Anderssen

Notes:

Click on "Move List" to see possible variations.
Symbols like =, +=, +/-, ??, and ! are briefly explained here.

» posted in Amazing Games

| 2122 reads | 13 comments |

1 vote:

Comments:

by figrock - 3 years ago
United States

Member Since: Jul 2008
Member Points: 1438

Nice Bishop sac to flush out the King and open lines for mate! Morphy is the man!

by Enkoi - 4 years ago
Philippines Philippines

Member Since: Oct 2007
Member Points: 15

Chess at the highest level...

by chessnoob1997 - 4 years ago
San Francisco United States

Member Since: Nov 2007
Member Points: 123

BAM BAM SHOT HIM RIGHT DOWN--

It's pure aggresive

by Kourosh - 4 years ago
tehran Iran

Member Since: Aug 2007
Member Points: 8

good game.

by Fellippo - 4 years ago
Zlín Czech Republic

Member Since: Aug 2007
Member Points: 556

I agree. They were both excellent players.

by jkor - 4 years ago
lecce Italy

Member Since: Oct 2007
Member Points: 186

Thank you so much!

Games like this one are the very reason I started and I would never quit playing chess !

by tanmay_chakrabarti - 4 years ago
Uttarpara India

Member Since: Jul 2007
Member Points: 2093

Very nice game indeed

by likesforests - 4 years ago
United States

Member Since: May 2007
Member Points: 4407

as you can see..i am still a novice!

So am I, when it comes to a game like these. They were unofficial world champions, real titans of chess. It's not surprising that we miss some moves.

by likesforests - 4 years ago
United States

Member Since: May 2007
Member Points: 4407

One way to see why Black resigned is to look at the squares being attacked by White's pieces. Black's king is almost in a mating net and he's severely behind in development:

What can Black try?

17...Qxc7 18.Raf1 Ke7 19.Rf7+ Kd8 20.Rxc7 Kxc7 21.Rc1 Kb6 22.Rxc2 and Black's down a pawn and a queen for a rook and bishop. Also, none of his pieces have left their starting squares, but White's pieces are already positioned to attack.

Anderssen could have played on... but in a losing position, against a tactical genius like Morphy, there was little point.

After the match, Anderssen wrote, "Morphy is too strong for any living player to hope to win more than a game here and there."

by Meowdar - 4 years ago
Georgia United States

Member Since: Sep 2007
Member Points: 104

But it's black's move.... I believe, though, that if 17. ...QxN 18. Raf1+! Ke7 19. Rf7+ and Anderssen is lost. (but as was noted, he gets a knight and rook...point-wise, only one point lost for black, but his development is shot to hell, and white actually then pins black's venturing knight on c2, winning it as well

[after RxQ KxR])