Darga-Spassky, part 1

This game is the intersection of a couple of interests for me. First of all, I’ve found that when top-notch players lose, the game is usually something special. In this case that is very true, although sometimes it’s “special” as in “cool” and sometimes “special” as in Special Olympics. The other interest at the time was self-improvement: I had decided to play through all the games of an interzonal, to see how some top-notch players played against each other and against people who weren’t quite so good.

Darga - Spassky Amsterdam IZ, 1964

1.Nf3 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3 b6
Spassky playing the QID? It soon becomes clear that this is not a good choice.
4.Bg2 Bb7 5.0-0 Be7 6.Nc3 0-0 7.d4 Bb4?!
Losing a tempo in order to give up the two bishops when your position is already really passive is not a good idea.
8.Qb3 Bxc3 9.Qxc3 d6 10.b3 Nbd7 11.Bb2 Re8 12.Rad1 Rc8 13.Rfe1?! Qe7 14.d5 e5 15.Nh4


Black's position is looking more and more like one of those textbook passive/inferior positions that will soon be wrecked by some attractive sacrifices. Put white’s rook back on f1 and use that tempo to play f4 and it becomes even clearer.

15...Nc5 16.f4 Nfd7 17.e3 a5 18.Qc2?!

Darga doesn't lose his advantage this way, but he shouldn't be pretending Black's queenside "play" amounts to anything. He has a huge space advantage and the two bishops, and he should be concentrating on a way to kill Spassky's king.

18...f6 19.a3 Ra8 20.Bc3 Qf7 21.Rf1


21...exf4 22.exf4?

I think this is where Darga starts to go really wrong. As played the rooks will just get exchanged on the e-file, instead of White being able to place them behind a pawn-storm. The crowd wants 22.Rxf4 when Black can't take the e-pawn because of 22...Rxe3 23.Nf5 Ree8 24.Rg4, threatening both Rxg7 and Nh6+

22...a4?!

The knight is just out of play on b3

23.b4 Nb3 24.Nf5 Nf8


25.Nd4?

Just leave the Nb3 alone! White should play something like 25.Kh1 and Rg1, Be4, g4-g5. To me, this is just the quintessential Soviet game. Throughout it, Darga seems to have the philosophy of just playing solidly, doing nothing the least bit interesting, and letting Spassky hang himself. Well, it eventually works, but the whole process would have been less painful for everyone if he’d just played real chess for more than one brief phase of the game.

25...Nxd4 26.Bxd4 Qg6

Another reason to have kept a knight on f5. I'm sure that Edmar Mednis would be thrilled beyond words to exchange queens with the two bishops in hand, but 99% of all other chess players would have wanted White's huge space plus to amount to something more substantial.

27.Qxg6 hxg6 28.Rfe1 Kf7 29.Kf2 Ba6 30.Bf1 f5?!

Now Black's king is tied down to the weakness at g7, and his bishop is worse.

31.Rxe8 Rxe8 32.Re1 Rd8 33.Bd3 Nd7 34.b5 Bb7 35.Bc2 Nc5 36.h4 Nb3

The same mistake twice!

37.Bc3 Bc8 38.Re3 Bd7 39.Re1 Rg8 40.Re3

It's hard to tell whether white is in time trouble and just wants to make the time control before doing anything, or is just dicking around to make the point that he can. Judging by his play later in the game, it's the latter.

40...Nc5 41.Bd4 Ra8 42.Ke1


42...Ne4 43.Bd1

Spassky is willing to give up a pawn immediately just to get opposite colored bishops, and indeed 43.Bxe4 fxe4 44.Rxe4 Re8 45.Rxe8 Bxe8 46.Kd2 Bd7 47.Kc3 Bg4 48.Kb4 Be2 is a clear draw

43...Re8 44.Bxa4

Darga, for his part, is willing to trade a good pawn for a lousy one in order to get the rooks off

44...Nxg3 45.Rxe8 Bxe8 46.Bc2 Nh5 47.Be3 Ke7


48.a4

Now Darga plays very energetically, precisely and resolutely for the only time in the entire game, and acquires a winning advantage. Edmar Mednis would faint for joy over his play over the next 17 moves.

48...Kd7 49.a5 bxa5 50.Kd2 Ng3 51.Kc3 g5! 52.hxg5 Bh5 53.Kb3 Be2 54.Bd2 a4+ 55.Kb4 a3 56.Bb3 Ne4 57.Be3 g6 58.Kxa3 Nc5 59.Bxc5! dxc5 60.Ka4 Bd3 61.Ka5

White will spend the rest of the game trying to achieve this sort of breakthrough again.

61...Be2 62.b6! cxb6+ 63.Kxb6 Kd6 64.Kb7 Bd3 65.Kc8 Be2


White now has a fairly standard win by walking his king over to f6, forcing Bh5. Then Black has to move his king, and (after Ba4-b5) White will be able to play Ke5, d5-d6, Kd5 and take the c-pawn (or just queen the d-pawn if Black puts his king on b6).

I'm wrong here -- as Todd Rowland points out in his comment below, Black has a stalemate cheapo: 66.Kd8? Bxc4! 67.Bxc4 stalemate. So Black has an unusual sort of "blockade" along the back rank, and the position must be drawn because the White king has no route into the Black position.

66.Kb7?? And all these question marks are undeserved... :-)

However, Darga, under some sort of hallucination, now painstakingly negates all his previous progress. This is the sort of continuation that gives rise to those stories of Soviet collaboration...

66...Bd3 67.Ka6?? Bf1 68.Ka5?? Bd3 69.Ka4?? Bf1 70.Ka3?? Be2 71.Kb2?? Ke7 72.Kc3 Kd6 73.Bc2 Ke7 74.Bd3 Yeah, that's going to work 74...Bd1 75.Kd2 Bb3 76.Be2 Kd6 77.Kc3 Ba4 78.Bd3 Bd1

At this point, both players seem to feel that all black needs to draw is to keep his bishop on this diagonal to keep the White king out -- counterattacking the c4 pawn if necessary.

79.Kd2 Bb3 80.Kc1 Ke7 81.Kb2 Bd1 82.Bc2 Be2 83.Kc3 Kd6 84.Ba4 Ke7 85.Bb5


85...Kd8 ?!? ?? And this is just a losing move.

At first, I thought that this gives White some chances he doesn't deserve, after Black has clearly demonstrated that he knows how to draw. But perhaps White can just place his bishop on b3 and walk his king up the board anyway, decoying the Black king if necessary by pushing the d-pawn.

This shows a big difference between chess then and modern chess with sudden death time controls. Both players (being much stronger than me and seeing the stalemate defence) must have realized that the position was a dead draw, for the reasons mentioned above. However, Darga was able to exercise his privilege of playing on and on and on, and eventually Spassky either lost concentration, had a mad impulse, or committed a fingerfehler... we'll never know. In a modern situation, Black could have pointed out that White isn't really trying to make progress and had the game called a draw that way -- and White wouldn't have been able to continue without risk, since he would also been in danger of losing on time.

Perhaps one day we'll consider the adjournment era as backwards as the pre-clock 1800s, where the slower players used to consider for hours over one move.

86.d6!?

This rules out the win just mentioned, because of the vulnerability of White's d-pawn. So now the win is very complicated. On the other hand, if the win in the last note doesn’t work, then this is White's only winning try and Black blew it on the previous move.

86.d6 Bf3 87.Kb3 Bd1+ 88.Ka3 Bc2 89.Bc6 Bd1 90.Ba4 Be2 91.Bb5 Bd1 92.Bc6


At this point, Spassky played 92...Be2? and resigned four moves later. However, he can continue his previous policy of king-containment with 92...Bc2, reaching the critical position for this ending. That position is the starting point for the second post in this series, Darga-Spassky, part 2 (the most beautiful bishop ending in the world)