Let’s All Get Rich Quick Scheme No.46

Those of you that followed the court case (it was in all the papers) will
know that Let’s All Get Rich Quick Scheme No.45 was a complete failure.

My idea of making a chess set with the heads of rare and protected birds
saw me paraded through a dozen courts in a dozens different countries.

My excuse that these birds were not rare, (there were quite a few of them)
and as far as I could see nobody was there protecting them, was not accepted.

But that is all in the past. The hate mail still arrives but is now down to one or two a week.

Let’s All Get Rich Quick Scheme No.46

The Mallard Tortoise, of which I am assured numbers in the few hundreds,
lives in caves in New Foundland. And as New Foundland is a country I have
not yet been banned from entering I expect to be richer than rich very soon.

The only difference between a rich man and a poor man is money.


No I am not scrimping on coloured ink, that is the actual colour of the cover.
Here to prove it is a picture of it next to a German Beer Drinking Song CD.
(Yes the same CD that figured in Let’s All Get Rich Quick Scheme No.11)

At first glance you would think it was Kasparov v Karpov playing each other in 1992.
It’s not, it’s Kasparov playing Karpov in Seville in 1987. (the title is a dead give away.)

The 1992 refers to the fact that Seville staged the 1992 World Expo Fair.

Why they wanted to advertise this by putting up 2,854,286 Swiss Francs to
hold the 1987 World Chess Championship has never been fully explained.
(possibly it was some Spaniards ‘Let’s All Get Richer Together Scheme.)

Apart from the drama of the last game. Kasparov had to win it and he did.
The 1987 Kasparov v Karpov match was a miserable affair with both players
apologising in print after the match for the poor quality of play and dull games.
The poor quality included two huge blunders not expected at this level of play.

Now me I love a good Blunder. It makes my day. It is proof of God’s existence.

First one from Kasparov in Game 23. Taimanov reckoned at the time this was one
of the most dramatic mistakes in the history of the World Chess Championship.

Karpov - Kasparov World Champion (23) Seville1987

The Karpov blunder is, as you would expect, a little more subtle.

Karpov - Kasparov World Champion (11) Seville1987

So you see even the great and the good are apt to throw a wobbly every now and then.
At our level we must remain alert at all times because our opponents will make blunders.

A blunder that made a big impression on me when I was a young player was:

Emanuel Lasker - Max Euwe, Nottingham 1936.

I think I can trace quite a few games I have turned into wins because I saw this one.
I’ve never forgotten it. It’s a game changer from a very harmless looking position.

The point being it was an unforced blunder, Euwe had no need to get involved in
playing for tit-for-tat exchanges. This kind of stuck with me. Added to the fact that
even in the most quiet and tame looking positions something bad is always lurking.

Here is one of my OTB games. Being alert, taking advantage of one loose move.
My opponent spent quite a fair amount of time before rejecting a move because
it only drew. Then spent just a few seconds choosing the move he actually played.

G. Chandler - W. Smerdon Edinburgh Chess League 1985

The move Black was thinking about was this cute variation.

We now switch to RHP for another example of tepid positions hiding pitfalls.

dndeleanu - kikko RHP 2006

Next we see White nicking a pawn and missing the point.

poundlee - fdelizo RHP 2007

So what are we learning today?

Everyone blunders. (trust me on this…everyone)

There is no such thing as a quiet lukewarm position.

Beware of thinking for a long time, rejecting the move you were considering
and then spending 10 seconds on playing another move. This is blunderland.

We close with our usual peek into Desolation Row.

Tucked away in the notes to game No 200 in Du Mont’s ‘200 Miniatures’ we see this tale of woe.

Spiel - Kunzel (no date or place)

The above sequence of moves has been repeated 25 times on RHP.
Most have resulted in Black winning a Queen and 0-1 but one game:

samwise222 - tiby99 RHP 2012

Differed slightly. Instead of winning a Queen Black lost a Rook

The thread accompanying this blog is Thread 161985