TOP 5 romantic chess players

This article is going to be devoted to showing you games from the most romantic chess players, and the players only count if they were creative, and playing in the romantic era (unlike Mikhail Tal that used to play at the end of the 20th century.) These are the nominees:

So we have 8 players: Adolf Anderssen, Paul Morphy, Aron Nimzovitch, Gioachino Greco, Wilhelm Steinitz, Howard Staunton, Napoleon Bonaparte (Yes, it's the one you know), Louis Paulsen.

           Maybe you have chosen one of the following players: Nimzovitch, Paulsen, Staunton; but I don't think they deserve their place in the top 5, as Paulsen and Nimzovitch were creative but they didn't sacrifice every move like the other players. Howard Staunton did some nice sacrifices and was used to play romantic gambits but he avoided playing against Paul Morphy, so I also don't think he deserves it.

Let's get started:

Position 5: Napoleon Bonaparte

Yes, even though he wasn't a professional chess player, as he was an emperor but unlike Nimzovitch and Paulsen he played spicy gambits. He's also got around 5 games in the chess.com database including a very famous one.

Here are some of his games:

That was his first game in 1802, against Madame de Remusat.

And then, two years later, they played the same game with switched colors: very suspicious!

In 1809, he played a game in Austria against The Automaton, but he lost it horribly! I'm going to show you the game because he played his own opening in it, Napoleon attack:

As you know, he has been exiled to Saint-Helene in 1815, the next game is a famous game played against General Bertrand at Saint-Helena in 1818.

So know, are you convinced that Napoleon was a good romantic player?

Position 4: Gioachino Greco

The first professional chess player invented the Italian game and the spicy fried liver attack. He deserves a place in the top 5 as this is one of his best games. It was played in 1600 against a very famous opponent "NN"

Position 3: Wilhelm Steinitz

Although he's the one that changed chess games from sac sac checkmate to positional rubbish he was also a romantic player and not a normal one, have a look at this game!:

Position 2: Adolf Anderssen

I don't think it's a surprise right?

Position 1: Paul MORPHY

Simply the best player ever, unlike the other players his sacrifices were perfect as his vision was very far. Some people might complain because his oppositions were weak, but they would stop if I tell them that he crushed many people at the same time blindfolded and sometimes with odds (spots people rooks, knights) . He only played chess for a couple of years and retired, what a pity!

In the following game, Morphy won brilliantly by sacrificing one piece from here and another one from there, and he spotted the guy a rook too!

Of course, there are looooots of magnificent Morphy games, but it's hard to find every single one of them in the database.

I hope you enjoyed. What should you expect if you follow me: Puzzles, openings, sacrifices, history of chess.