When asked in Gibraltar who, among the great players of the past, would he like to play, this was Anand's answer: "Morphy. His talent was enormous. The opponents he had to face were far stronger than is usually accepted, too. Fischer had the same opinion about this".
The Unknown Morphy: was he really that strong?
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Here's what Bobby Fischer had to say about Morphy:
"Perhaps the most accurate player who ever lived, he would beat anybody today in a set-match. He had complete sight of the board and seldom blundered even though he moved quite rapidly. I've played over hundreds of his games and am continually surprised and entertained by his ingenuity"
Feb 4, 2016
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#105
Fischer's not a great authority. He was trying to find American masters to compare favorably with the Soviet GMs he was facing.
Feb 4, 2016
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#106
Just to clarify- in his "Top Ten" article from Brady's "Chessworld," Fischer included two Russians, Tschigorin and Alekhine and two Soviets, Tal and Spassky (as well as one Englishman, Staunton; one German, Tarrasch; one Austrian, Steinitz; and three Americans, two from the US, Morphy and Reshevsky [a Polish immigrant] and one from Cuba, Capablanca).
"Just to clarify- in his "Top Ten" article from Brady's "Chessworld," Fischer included two Russians, Tschigorin and Alekhine and two Soviets, Tal and Spassky"
No Soviet player in the top seven though, but to me including Reshevsky, Tarrasch and Chigorin while excluding players like Lasker and Botvinnik is the strangest thing on that list. I think Lasker is one of the three greatest ever, and that also after Karpov, Kasparov, Anand, Carlsen etc entered the picture.
Thanks to Batgirl, she mention it was a blindfold simul. Morphy played eight opponents similtaneously, two draws and six wins; to have such a difficult game against Guibert and not one lost is incredible.
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The following eight games were played at the Cafe de la Regence, Paris, on September 27, 1858, during an interval in the Morphy-Harrwitz match. The performance lasted ten hours, and the first two players to surrender, Potier, and Preti, both held out to about the seventh hour. The American journalist "Malakoff", writing to the New York Times of the affair, stated that "around each of the eight boards there was a large collection of excellent chess players, who gave their advice freely." Whether or not there was really this additional handicap, the blindfold player's achievement was a splendid one; for he won 6 and drew 2 games against a powerful opposition and, moreover, made no error of real importance. Morphy vs H Baucher, 1858 Morphy vs C Bierwirth, 1858 Morphy vs Bornemann, 1858 Morphy vs Guibert, 1858 Morphy vs J L Preti, 1858 Morphy vs W Potier, 1858 Morphy vs E Lequesne, 1858 Morphy vs C A Seguin, 1858
Look at these masterful games of Morphy, there is only one conclusion; he is a chess genius.
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HueyWilliams wrote:
yureesystem wrote:
the only way a player is going to get better is to do their own analysis.
I'm pretty sure that this site proves that not to be the case.
It depends in how you look at it, I sure some articles from IMs and GMs are helpful, tactical trainer can help and you played other players which can help your develop your skill level. I believe in chess books and independent studies. In this thread looking at Morphy's game against Guibert highly instructive, first: prelimilary analysis on this game and than going deeper to understand this game better, eventually you come to some discoveries and conclusion. Nimzovitch did this, analyzing master games and writing his discoveries: maybe other players might want to contribute ssome of their thoughts in this game, I welcome any positive comment.