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By Larry Parr
Chess Life Editor 1984 - 1988
Author
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WORSE
THAN A CRIME?
(Continued)
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WHEN
CHESS GODS BLUNDER
(I)
Grandmasters
commit shocking blunders every day. Even
the gods of chess - the world champions from Philidor to Kramnik - have hung
pieces and overlooked mates. No one
can answer Friedrich Nietzsche’s conundrum - “What is it:
is man only a blunder of God, or God only a blunder of man” - but we
all ought to know that man is the blunderer of chess.
Yet one constantly hears chess writers describe a blunder as
“unbelievable.” Believe it!
Chess would have no pretensions beyond being sophisticated checkers
unless its inherent difficulty prevented true mastery of its intricacies and
pitfalls.
Still more amazing than chess scribblers entering shock when a Capablanca
loses a piece before move 10 or an Anatoly Karpov resigns as White on move 12 is
the tendency of the great masters themselves - the very people who know how
vulnerable they are to error - to
overlook astonishing mistakes made by their fellow masters.
Rodney Dangerfield says that he “don’t get no respect,” while
international-level masters frequently accord one another too much respect.
In Ebralidze-Ragozin (Soviet Championship, 1937), the Black player, who
was one of the leading Soviet grandmasters of the 1930s and 1940s, made one of
the great blunders in chess history.
Ragozin
(to play)
Ebralidze
40.
....
Rc7???
Black’s idea is that he wins the Bishop vs. Knight ending after 41.
Rxc7 Bd6+ -- or, more accurately, double check, one of which is a discovery on
his own King.
41.
Rd5???
The White player was a fine, positional master who was Tigran
Petrosian’s first trainer. What makes this counter-blunder so astonishing is that
directly after Black’s blunder, a spectator shouted, “Archil, take the
rook!” Ebralidze replied, “I
can see - don’t interfere!” Whereupon,
he played the text rather than 41. Rxc7. As
the commotion grew in the tournament hall, Ebralidze finally realized his error,
clutching his head in despair. What
happened? White believed blindly in
the authority of his famous opponent. That’s
what happened!
41
...
Bf6 42. Nb5 Rc2+ 43. Kg3 a6 44.
Rd7+ Ke8 45. Rc7 Be5+, White
resigns
Final
position.
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