The would have been great match that never took place
Magic of ’72 match hasn’t been repeated and likely won’t be
Saturday, March 15, 2008 3:02 AM
By SHELBY LYMAN
The 1972 match between Bobby Fischer and Boris Spassky was a classic chess struggle.
The better player won. It wasn’t easy, but Fischer prevailed.
The American public was enthralled by the five-hour battles that unfolded on their television screens via PBS.
Yes, the chess was wonderful, but, most of all, the handsome, unimaginably stubborn and independent, rough-hewn youth from New York dominated the collective consciousness.
His personality transcended national borders. Grandmaster Gregory Kaidanov, who eventually settled in the United States, recalls: “I felt (as a kid in the Soviet Union) that by choosing Fischer as my chess hero, I was rebelling against surrounding reality.”
But the American never played a serious match again, and the momentum was lost. There was nothing to replace Fischer and Spassky — nothing equivalent to duplicate the magical moment of 1972.
If it were presented on television, the 1997 Kasparov-Deep Blue match — man vs. machine — might have been another chess Super Bowl, albeit of a different kind. But IBM, perhaps fearful that its protege would lose, had little interest in such coverage. A unique historic moment was lost to most of the public.
Source: The Columbus Dispatch
I disagree with Shelby Lyman.
The match between Fischer and Spassky was not a classic struggle. It was a poor match marred by numerous ridiculous blunders. The chess was not wonderful (only the amount of publicity).
It was, contrary to what Shelby says, easy for Fischer. Spassky handed Fischer a string of virtual giveaway victories from games 3 to 10 after which the match was effectively over.
Fischer’s play was not so flash either – not nearly on the same level as in 1970 and 1971. Fischer lost ridiculously in both games 1 and 11; he played poorly in games 4, 14 and 15 and should have lost all of these. He blew easy wins in game 13 early on, and in game 7.
Spassky was not one of the really great Champions, so the match was not a real classic in terms of two super-greats playing each other. Going into the match, Fischer was rated 125 points above Spassky. In what other World Championship match has the Champion had such an inferior rating to the challenger? It was only a classic in terms of publicity.
Karpov, on the other hand, was a really great Champion and would have provided much stiffer opposition than Spassky did.
Already in 1974, Karpov beat Spassky by a similar margin to what Fischer did. And Spassky played much better in that match, not making the numerous absurd blunders that he did in the Fischer match; these being what gave Fischer his margin of victory.
“There was nothing to replace Fischer and Spassky”.
Well, if this was the case, then it was entirely Fischer’s fault for refusing to play Karpov – this would have been a fantastic match.
But in any case, apart from the publicity aspect, this statement is utter rubbish. In chess terms, Kasparov and Karpov were more than a replacement. Their matches were real classics, and the quality of their play was on a considerably higher plane than Fischer – Spassky.
what match or group of matches won’t have erros.. every match you look at probaly has some bad moves unless your talking about rybka which is just a machine that doesnt make mistakes… that being said the games had some great tactics.. i believe fischer would have raised his game against karpov.. he would have given a dominating performance and would have won by a huge margin..fischer was always able to raise his game to at least a notch or more above his opponents.. maybe fischer got bored playing spassky and didnt take him as seriously as he should have ..which led to his mistakes in a few games..nonethless kasparov vs karpov never came close to replacing the potential match fischer vs karpov..
I cant agree more that this event is won’t likely to repeat.
To the 1st anonymous post. Throughout Fischers career almost all of his opponents had excuses when they played Bobby and lost. Bobby put so much pressure on opponents with his aggressive attacking style that his rivals due to stress got colds, flu, and high blood pressure. When Bobby ran the table on Larsen 6-0 and Taimanov 6-0 and keep in mind these were candidate matches for the right to play for The World Crown, Larsen had the excuse the altitude got to him in Colorado.
Haha at least Taimanov took his beating like a man. Bobby also destroyed Petrosian on his way to Spassky. Maybe had you played Fischer in 1972 you would have avoided all theses blunders the great Champion Boris Spassky made!
Kasparov himself has stated that the match Karpov-Fisher in ’75 would be very close, and that Karpov was already possibly stronger.
I really believe it would have been a great match. BUT the Karpov-Kasparov matches were also great. Two of the greatest chess players ever, with different styles and personalities, played many many high level very close mathces.
What else would we expect? The only thing lacking, was the cold-war background (since they were both soviets).
To anonymous 1:43
Larsen had a genuine excuse in that there was an over 100 degree Farenheit heatwave during his match. He said he was unable to sleep at night. Larsen was from a cold Scandinavian country, so would have been much more affected by this than Fischer, who would be more used to this sort of thing.
Also Fischer only got 6-0 because Larsen kept overreaching trying to win in positions where he had no advantage. Larsen could easily have drawn games 2, 5 and 6 had he decided to do so.
Taimanov was not of real World Championship class. He only got into the Candidates by virtue of a thrown game in the last round of the 1970 Interzonal. Also he was 44 at the time.
Fischer ran into real trouble against Petrosian at the start of their match. Petrosian’s problem was his laziness in striking when the other guy is down. Petrosian should have won Game 3 and possibly Game 5. Fischer might have had a real problem then. Fischer got a scare in this match.
Also Petrosian was 42, Fischer 28.
In any case I already said that Fischer’s play in the 1972 match was well below his 1971 standard. In 1971, he played admirably.
Of course I would make more mistakes than Spassky.
Very likely many of Spassky’s blunders were caused by being unsettled by Fischer’s abominable behaviour at the start of the match. So this was Fischer’s fault.
But the point I was making was that the standard of the chess, for whatever reason, was well below the standard to be expected from a World Championship match, contrary to what Shelby is saying.
It won’t repeat unless Boby walks the earth as a member of the undead!
Get your garlic and wooden chess pieces…
who is this clown to say what’s sub standard..he couldn’t tell a good game form a bad game.. hes just regurgitating something he read .. did he actually study any of the games.. i doubt it.. he’s clearly making excuses for fischer dominating his opponents… to say a guy cant take hot weather because he’s from the cold and thats the reason he lost is hilarious.. then if thats the case any players from a cold region should be given three wins to start any match where the temperatures reach above 100 degrees..get real pal.. likewise to say because some of the players were in there forties and that made them subpar players is equally ridiculous… that doesnt make sense because if they were so terrible why did they qualify to compete at the highest levels.. karparov was still at his peak over forty years old..so was karpov..so was korchnoi… so reaching forty doesnt mean a rapid deterioration into chess oblivion you imbicile