I liked this and understand much of it, such as why black cannot play Bh6 etc, and I guess 4...Bg3 is met by 5 Rg4 Bf2 6 Rg2 but I feel it needs more clarification, if someone else has more time???  I thank you in advance.

That's kind of why i put it up. i get most of it but an analysis would be nice from someone

Very cute finale (I love 5... Kh6 6 Rh3+).

Earlier on, if Black puts his bishop on his third rank White will always be able to play Rc1, and after ... Kh6, Rc6(+) will win the bishop.  On any other bishop move, White just attacks it with the rook--such as 4... Bg3 5 Rc3 (although EscapestPawn's line works as well).

Moral of the story:  get your king to a corner square that's the opposite color from the one your bishop is on!

Great puzzle.  I didn't get it at all at first.  I had to try to win as white against Fritz before I really got it. 

In case this helps, white rook has to get to any of the squares on the h-file h1-h5 without the black king moving, for checkmate.  In order to do that the rook has to keep attacking (in a sense, checking) the bishop until the bishop is in a position where it can't stop the rook from either getting to a mating square, or capturing the bishop, or pinning the bishop to the king.

This is very strange to see this game on a forum. I had just been looking over this game on chessgames.com (here). Believe it or not, I had simply stumbled on the game (looking for a different game of Mikhail's), and was going to post this endgame. When I first saw this endgame, it just seemed magical to me. Now, after studying it, everything makes sense, but it still amazes me that Tal saw this. He sacrificed the pawn, and checked at the right moment just to get the King on the right square.

tonydal wrote:

Moral of the story:  get your king to a corner square that's the opposite color from the one your bishop is on!

Yes, that is true, but Zhidkov did not walk into this one. Tal was pushing a pawn on the h-file and converted the advantage perfectly. There was no way out for Valery. Check out the link in my previous post to see the whole game.

The rule is never get your king cornered on the bishop coloured sq in a bishop vs rook ending....as long as you avoid this, the game can be drawn.

TonightOnly wrote:

tonydal wrote:

Moral of the story:  get your king to a corner square that's the opposite color from the one your bishop is on!

Yes, that is true, but Zhidkov did not walk into this one. Tal was pushing a pawn on the h-file and converted the advantage perfectly. There was no way out for Valery. Check out the link in my previous post to see the whole game.

Yeah, I have Tal's Complete Games 1967-1973, so I looked it up this morning before logging on, and duly noted 89 h6+!  That is TRULY bizarre by the way that you were looking at this game (and by mistake!) just before you came across this post [sounds of eerie Twilight Zone music]...

It was a NICE Game, but I do not get Valery Zhidkov's LAST move...

ADK