Morning all, I'd like to show you this morning where I consider bobby Fischer’s last great
game masterpiece and we will be visiting games earlier than this.
This was in 1992, 20 years after the classic encounter with Spassky in Reykjavik, the 1972
match 20 years later.
Fischer is playing this match for the kind of title of world champion.
Because even though he vacated the FIDE world title, he still felt he was world champion.
The US didn't really want him to play this match.
It was played in Belgrade Yugoslavia and there was actually an order to provide information
and cease and assist activities or the to Fischer and this can be seen on chess Gamescom.
Okay now so the importance of that latter Fischer did play this match and you know he
couldn't stay in the United States after.
That's why we didn't see much of him after this match.
This was his last official match.
It's a real tragedy for chess.
That firstly there was a 20-year gap after the 1972 and then you know this match yes
for a huge prize fund he was lured out to play.
But with huge penalties to him personally.
So okay why was he tempted out?
The Yugoslavia business man who organized the match, Jezdimir Vasiljevic he specified
five-million-dollar prize fund, which is the biggest ever offered in chess.
His unconditional demands specified a clock that patented was to be used, Noah Germans,
the winner will be the first of ten games draws not counting.
FIDE was not in any way involved and the match was to play for the world championship title,
which Fischer still held himself to be as he had only vacated the FIDE title.
This is like the end of Fisher's official chess, but I think this is one of my favorite,
one of his last games that I really find a masterpiece.
So e4 from Fischer.
Okay Spassky playing black plays the Sicilian defense.
Nc3, Nc6.
Now Nge2, a bit of an unusual move order here.
We still get the open Sicilian, not a closed variation with g3, Fischer plays d4 here.
So, c takes, Knight takes, d6. Scheveningen pawn Center from black.
Be3 and this looks, this really is like the English attack system popularized by many
English GM's in 80s and 90s to play f3 in Qd2.
Just treat it like a dragon basically.
Even though it starts as Sicilian dragon.
So, we get Nf,6 Qd2, Ng4 might actually be possible here.
It doesn't move, but the most popular is just Be7, which is played.
Now f3.
So, treating it as though it's a dragon, of course it's not a dragon.
But it's still just strengthens the central supports g4.
Which can be you know quite dangerous.
So a6 and now white castles Queen side.
In fact, one of the highest rated players ever beaten in FIDE time controls was Murugan
and I played this English attack system with the plan f3g4 and even later as we'll see,
there's some similarities actually to my plan.
Its a very kind of easy to play position sometimes.
So, castles, just you know looks primitive g4, but it really does offer black a lot of
danger.
How come black get enough counter play that quickly on the Queen side?
Well Boris takes on d4 here.
Bd4, now b5.
So, operations have already started you know for Bb7 for Rc8, maybe b4 to put pressure
on e4 and maybe d5 at some point.
So, we see g5, nd7.
Now h4 and like my game against Murugan, you know I really without allowing Bg5, you want to
maybe sometimes get the king out of the way.
But the thematic plan, let's forget about Bg5 for a moment.
Let’s play for g6.
So, open up files against the king.
B4, from white now, Na4.
White seems a little bit misplaced here.
But it does control the b6 square.
Bb7 and now this is the first moment of what I would call brilliance actually from Fischer.
There's a very very nice move here, which is kind of resolves the problem of the Knight
on a4.
Because that actually, let's have a look at this.
Let's put on the Kibitzer.
I think black is actually potentially threatening Bc6 here.
With actually a very big advantage.
Of course, if white is falls for b3, then it's disastrous for the structure.
So that is a very very big threat to address and the stronger you can get, the more stylish
you can address these kinds of threats I guess and there's a very very stylish way this threat
was addressed.
Qxb4 you know looks a bit dangerous to expose the Queen to d5 and giving that potential,
you know counter play protecting in theory.
That wasn't played, if I give you 10 seconds here can you guess another move?
I'll rule out Qxb4 for you.
So, what would you play here?
10 seconds starting from now.
Okay Nb6 and my engine assistant reckons this is the absolute best move in the position
and the point is, after Nxb6, we would have, if this was played, we would have Qxb4 and
it's quite embarrassing here for black.
This isn't offering too much counter play at all for black.
For example, like this, there's a good grip on dark squares.
Maybe just Qd4.
So, there's not much going on here.
This is a nice pawn up in this particular scenario.
Blacks choice to use you know maybe the bishop coming back here for c3 and also a6 is loose.
So, let's go back, its a very nice move here already.
Rb8 is played by Spassky and then we see Nxd7.
So, what is the outcome?
It's removed one of white’s worst pieces for potentially one of the blacks more aggressive
pieces.
So, the aggressions kind of taken out in the position a bit.
But the idea is not to take care, this would just give black counter play.
White wants to really carry on with his own Kings side attack.
He plays Kb1 for a moment.
Okay Qc7 is played and that's eying of course doubling for c2, Bd3 and now Spassky plays
Bc8.
Okay and now we get in this h5 and it looks as though g6 this absolutely formatted move.
It's fantastic to get in.
If you can get it in an English attack system, you're usually doing very very well, very
very dangerous for black after this.
Just you know just to demonstrate the real dangers of g6, let's give them token move.
I just want to show you a particularly subtle tactic if you've got the Bishop on d4.
Which I know from my game against Murugan, a similar kind of thing.
This kind of position is always something like Rh8++, because you've got a nice pin
here.
That kind of thing you know shows the dangers even if blacks extra pawns.
Its really dangerous once the files opened up.
But a5 wasn’t played.
We see e5 blotting out the bishop.
But weakening a bit, the Light Squared.
Be3, Be6.
Now Rdg1.
So still going for this g6, a5 and now g6, very dangerous indeed to get this in.
Bf6 and looks as though black wants these this extra pawn where h7 to shield his own
king.
So gxh7.
So even though okay it's an extra pawn by Kh8 is black keeping all the files closed.
That's really what intuitively wants to do to defend this position.
But now we see curious, you might think this is a curious move.
Obviously, you don't want to block up the position of h6.
That's the end of the attack, near enough.
You know g6 and blacks absolutely fine it seems.
No, you want to try and undermine blacks chain here, g7 f6 chain.
So, the exploitable base of that is actually the Bishop on f6.
So, we see Bishop g5 just trying take off f6 and then maybe you know Qh6 is really dangerous
after.
So that's the real threats here if given the time just taking and Qh6. Let's have a quick look.
if a4, we just take and Qh6, it will be devastating.
So now is there a time for Bg5?
Let's have a quick look.
Qg5, I think that will be very dangerous indeed.
F6 though does defend g7, Qg6, but now we've got a threat of h6 surely.
That's the imminent threat and that is really really dangerous for g8 and f6.
This might not be defendable.
Let's give a4 for example h6 and what does black do here?
If he takes here, Rh6 is actually a forced mate now.
Because the idea is actually Qg8 taking it in like this.
So just to demonstrate that like this is mating.
So that's the real dangers here.
So Spassky’s move Qc7 is one of the main defenses available on the Bg5 is to be considered.
Qe7 and now Fischer plays Rg3.
So very simply he's just putting mounting the pressure on that G file.
So, his next book will just be either taking on f6 or just rook hg1.
It's just putting more and more pressure on g7.
Spassky takes on g5, Rxg5 ok and ok how does black actually defend this?
It's very very uncomfortable to defend here.
Maybe best is f6.
This is the engine suggestion to try and defend the position.
So, for example like this, Bf7, I'm not entirely convinced by this that this could hold up.
There might be some great resources.
So, the idea here it is sneaky for Ba2 to b3, Be8.
So how does white make progress?
It might be a little bit tricky here, with the bishop covering some key squares.
So okay, so in game though we see actually Qf6, which makes things a little bit easier
it seems for white.
Because g7 looks more fragile here than it was there.
At least it was defendable along that second rank.
So now we get Rhg1, okay and Spassky takes this pawn on f4.
I'm not really sure what to suggest for him.
Because why it's goanna be troubling here.
If he takes this pawn you know white is going to be trebling and it's like really really
dangerous.
If we have like Rg8 here, that’s actually a crushing move Rg6 in this position.
This is pretty nasty stuff.
If Queen moves, we take on g7 and f takes we get this h-file to win like this.
We are mating like this.
Okay so that's eventually like mating. Black puts things in the way.
So Rg6 would be a crusher there.
So, it looks pretty miserable.
So, in this position yeah, we see Qxf3, allowing Rxg7 and though the Queen comes back, and
it looks as though hold on, is this so bad?
Is this really so bad?
Okay what's the actual concrete thing being threatened here?
At least the Queen is stopping these invasive Qh6 moves.
Now that resources completely stamped out.
So how does white actually progress?
Well we see the move h6 here and this is a very very interesting move, very very powerful
move.
In fact, one of the best moves in the position.
Because its a brilliant idea now after a4.
Well first Fischer shows up the Queen side.
He takes a little bit of time to show up the Queen side.
Which is actually reminiscent of one of the classic games in the 72, where he takes a
little bit of time on the Queen side to stop a bit of counter play.
He plays b3, it's not, I'm not entirely sure it's strictly necessary.
But nothing's going away from white’s attack, so he can do this.
A take, a take.
So now the attack can really proceed without any other distractions.
So, after Rfd8, can you see White's winning method here I wonder.
Well maybe not yet.
Let's go a little bit further.
Now Qg2 is played.
Rf8 and now you might want to pause the video or I'm going to put an interactive link on
the right where you can try this as an interactive puzzle here.
So, treat this as your puzzle position.
So, 10 seconds starting from now we pause the video, you will use the interactive on
the right and then carry on playing the video.
So, 10 seconds time from now, what would you play as white?
Okay it's, the move itself is of little significance really.
It's the far continuation idea, the fantastic idea behind this is that white actually wants
to get rid of the blockage on the h5.
He wants to use the h file for attack and to do this he plays Rg8++ and now clearly
black cannot take on g8.
He is going to get mated.
So Kxh7.
So, offering that pawn and now Rg7++ is the idea.
There's no other major thing here.
If Qg7, then that's not much.
You know we just take here and we've messed up the attack actually.
Not Kxh7, but Kh8, it's a bit messed up.
No that's certainly not the idea.
The idea was to just now go back once we go in that a7 pawn, Kh8, no try and get the shake
off this other pawn with h7.
You might think what's the point of this?
The subtle point is this h-file now becomes a viable resource for a lethal check.
After Rg8, it rules out the Kh7 resource.
Black has to resign here.
What can black do?
Let’s give black a move just to demonstrate.
Say Spassky play Rfe8, we play check.
Now black cannot take on g8, you'll get mated.
Because that pawns helping.
So Kxh7.
We've got rid of both of those pawns.
So Qh2++ is lethal here.
If Qh6, that doesn't help, check here is mate.
So that's the basic idea.
So, this is how the whole game, pardon me, caught my attention.
It was this presented as a puzzle position from here.
But then you know the game filled me with some sadness.
It's in the puzzle book somewhere, but the game fills me with sadness.
Because it's reminder you know Fisher has stopped for 20 years and Kasparov was quite
critical of this match as though Fischer was a golden now descended to earth and some of
the games weren't that good.
But I think this was the last great achievement of the match for me personally.
Because I’ve got personal identity with this game, English attack.
I had fond memories myself in this.
So, I thought it is a fantastic demonstration of you know the g file pressure from the English
attack system.
I hope you enjoyed it, comments or questions on YouTube.
Thanks very much.
So, the game continued just like this, after h7 black resigned.