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For the 4th game in our Best Games of Chess series, I have selected a famous game played by Garry Kasparov and Veselin Topalov at Wijk aan Zee, 1999. For those (like me) who like to use the chessgames.com "Guess the Move" chess training tool to play through master games of chess, here is a link to the game on that web site: Guess-the-Move Kasparov-Topalov 1999. I'll present the full game, below, but in order not to give the moves away for those using the "Guess the Move" utility, I'll first present a few comments on this game. First, here's a picture of the two contestants as Kasparov (right) is about to make the opening move: This game is known as "Kasparov's Immortal Game", and Garry Kasparov himself has claimed this was the greatest game of chess he ever played. Andrew Soltis thought this was the 5th best game of chess ever played (as he described it in "The 100 Best Games of the 20th Century, Ranked"). GM Larry Christiansen, in his book "Storming the Barricades" stated that "Kasparov's Masterpiece ranks among the very top games of all time. It deserves a place in the Louvre." Before presenting the actual game, here is a little puzzle. Can you guess the move Kasparov made in this position? This game was featured in Burgess, Nunn, and Emms excellent "Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games". Their introduction to the game states: "You are about to witness one of the most extraordinary king-hunts in the history of chess. The opening and early middlegame are relatively quiet: Kasparov adopts an aggressive stance, but Topalov plays flexibly and obtains a fully acceptable position. Indeed, Kasparov is fighting not to be worse from move 14 to move 24, but as so often when a great champion's back is against the wall, he gives his opponent plenty of chances to go horribly wrong. In a moment of inspiration, an amazing idea pops into Kasparov's mind, and he embarks upon a sacrificial sequence. Topalov bravely decides to play down the main line when he had a perfectly safe alternative, but it turns out that Kasparov had been right: his pieces and pawns work in perfect harmony to hunt down the errant black king." Without further ado, here is the game: Finally, for those who are interested, I found this video of the game to be illuminating: YouTube Video of Kasparov-Topalov, 1999 as well as this annotated version by GM Yasser Seirawan: Inside Chess Analysis of Kasparov-Topalov, 1999. I encourage the members of our study group to post a response when they have played through this game. Please let us know your score if you used the "Guess the Move" chess training tool, or if you manually scored the game by awarding 3 pts for each of Kasparov's moves that you guessed correctly. FYI - par score for this game is 58 pts, corresponding to correctly guessing roughly 19-20 of the 44 moves in this game. Finally, please provide your own comments on the game or pointers to other commentators who have annotated this game. Thanks for participating!

All: I recently came across this most excellent topic for a study group and was sad to find it dormant/abandoned. This is such a rich and rewarding focus to a group and I would like to engage with all members revive this group. To that end I humbly request the groups support to become the new SA. I am hoping to get support in this effort and I hope to have as many of you as possible join me in breathing life back into goals and purpose that led to forming this club. A Little about me. I am a life long chess lover who rediscovered my passion for the game roughly a year ago as I was looking for a club for my two sons ( whom I taught ). I found a great club, and joined along with them decided to actually become studious about my chess learning for both myself and my sons benefit. I played my first tournament in December 2018 ( in the Open section because I like a challenge ) and surprisingly did not get totally crushed (and I earned my initial FIDE rating ). Outside of the many many many games played on Chess.com, I've since played OTB in individual and Club Team and Regional Team matches and have been making slow and steady progress in many facets of my chess game and understanding ( and I am very much interested in continuing that improvement ). I believe that studying great chess games and chess games of the greats is a key part of becoming a better and what better way that to do so with a group of passionate chess comrades, dissecting, analyzing, discussing and learning in a mutually beneficial forum such as this club. I hope you guys will join me and I look forward to getting started. Regards Bryan

As you play through each game, please reply in the individual game forums with your scores (if you scored the game) and your thoughts/comments. I'll periodically update the following table to chart the progress of our study group members as we play through the various games. The list is sorted by the entry in the Pts column, which represents the total number of games each member has analyzed (one point per game). G A M E S (w/ hot links to each forum) Name/ID Pts 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 ----------- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ---- ECHOOooo 1 x ----------- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- ----

To kick things off, here's a game played between Yakov Estrin and Hans Berliner for the World Correspondence Championship 1965-1968. Play the role of Berliner and try to guess each move he makes in this game. Give yourself 3 pts for each correct guess, 1 or 2 if you're sure you made a good alternative move, and deduct 1 or 2 for "bad" choices. Or, use the www.chessgames.com "Guess the Move" utility to automate this process for you. Report your scores and comment on the game in this forum.

This is the famous "Immortal Game", played between Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritsky during a break in the First International Tournament played in London, England during the Great Exhibition of 1851. The following description is abstracted from several Wikipedia articles, including this etching of the Crystal Palace where the tournament was held: The very bold sacrifices made by Anderssen to finally secure victory have made it one of the most famous chess games of all time. This game is acclaimed as an excellent demonstration of the style of chess play in the 19th century, where rapid development and attack were considered the most effective way to win, where many gambits and counter-gambits were offered (and not accepting them would be considered slightly ungentlemanly), and where material was often held in contempt. Anderssen gave up both rooks and a bishop, then his queen, checkmating his opponent with his three remaining minor pieces. It has been called an achievement "perhaps unparalleled in chess literature". The tournament was organized by Howard Staunton and featured many of the top players of the day. Here's a list of the players and their tournament results (note that the tournament was won by Anderssen): Here's the Immoratal Game PGN: As always, play through this game, taking on the role of Anderssen. Try to guess each move Anderssen made in the game and award yourself 3 points for each guess (I realize the full PGN is displayed above...try not to peek!). Or, use the chessgames.com Guess-the-Move chess training tool to score the game for you. Report your scores and thoughts on the game by replying to this forum thread. I'll summarize everyone's particpation in the Roll Call posting.

Today's game is a rather famous battle between Mikhail Botvinnik and Jose Capablanca, from the 1938 AVRO tournament. The following photograph was taken at a match in Moscow, two years earlier (Capablana is on the left): From the Wikipedia: The AVRO tournament was a chess tournament held in the Netherlands in 1938, sponsored by the Dutch broadcasting company AVRO. The event was a double round-robin tournament. The eight players generally regarded as the strongest in the world took part: World Champion Alexander Alekhine, former champions José Raúl Capablanca and Max Euwe, future champion Mikhail Botvinnik and challengers Paul Keres, Reuben Fine, Samuel Reshevsky and Salo Flohr. Keres and Fine tied for first place, with Keres winning on tiebreak by virtue of his 1½-½ score in their individual games. Capablanca, who had only lost 26 tournament games over a span of 29 years, lost four games in this event. He had suffered a mild stroke during this tournament and his ill health was largely responsible for this poor performance. The tournament was apparently organised in the hope that it would provide a challenger to Alekhine, but it was not an official Candidates Tournament, and World War II dashed any hopes of a championship match for years to come. However, when FIDE organised its 1948 match tournament for the world title after Alekhine's death in 1946, it invited the six surviving AVRO participants (Capablanca had also died), except that Flohr was replaced by Vasily Smyslov. About this game, Garry Kasparov wrote: "... Botvinnik played what was altogether the 'game of his life' against Capablanca. It was not just that it was judged the most brilliant in the tournament and to be worth two first prizes, but it was even suggested that, by analogy with the 'immortal' and 'evergreen' games, it should be called 'peerless' or 'classical'!" I recommend playing through this game using the www.chessgames.com "Guess the Move" chess training tool. If you are not a member of chessgames.com, you can simulate/self-score by awarding 3 points for each move by Botvinnik that you can guess correctly. Optional: You can fine-tune your simulated version by awarding 1 or 2 points for OK moves and deducting the same for poor alternatives (using your own judgement or a chess engine, such as Rybka or Shredder). FYI, here's what chessgames.com has to say about their "Guess the Move" tool: Welcome to Chessgames.com's revolutionary chess training tool, Guess-the-Move!You can review some of the greatest chess games in history, move by move, and try to guess what move the winner played each step of the way. It's a fun, challenging, and competitive way to improve your chess. It's almost like playing against a grandmaster. Your "opponents" will be some of the strongest players in history. When your GM opponent makes a threat, you'll have to decide how to counter it. And to win the game, you'll have to decide how and when to strike! More than a training tool, it's also a game: you accumulate points based on the merits of your guesses, and at the end, you'll receive a final total score. You can gauge your strength by comparing your score against those of other Chessgames members. Studying grandmaster games by guessing what move comes next is an excellent way to get better. Some of the world's greatest chess coaches recommend this technique as one of the key methods to improve your chess. Please reply to this forum with your scores and comments about the game.