Introduction

Introduction

Viktor Korchnoi (b.1931) had two chess careers. The first was as an elite grandmaster of the Soviet Union, where four times he won the prestigious national championship. The second was as a Soviet dissident, following his request for political asylum just after the Amsterdam international tournament, where he tied for first place in July 1976.

So great was Korchnoi's impact on chess history that he was the only non-World Champion to merit a full chapter in Garry Kasparov's opus on his Great Predecessors. Korchnoi played title matches in 1978 and 1981 against arch-rival Anatoly Karpov, as well as an earlier candidates final match against Karpov in 1974 to choose a challenger for then World Champion Bobby Fischer. That match became a de facto title match when Fischer declined to defend his title in 1975 and was forfeited.

Korchnoi's opponent in this game was Laszlo Kovacs (b.1938) a Hungarian player who earned the International Master (IM) title in 1965. The game was played at the Sarajevo international tournament, in the spring of 1969. Korchnoi finished first (+9-0=6), two points ahead of runnerup Milan Matulovic (YUG), who was a half point ahead of Svetozar Gligoric (YUG) and Wolfgang Uhlmann (DDR). Kovacs finished 15th (+2-8=5) in the field of 16 players.

A few months before the Sarajevo tournament Korchnoi had lost another candidates final match (+1-4=5) to Boris Spassky. Spassky went on to beat Tigran Petrosian for the World Championship, which he lost to Fischer in 1972.

Our notes are based on Korchnoi's in Viktor Korchnoi's Best Games, published in 1977. The book included 60 of Korchnoi's games, most of them annotated by Korchnoi.

Next move: 1.e4 • For more about White's first move, see our tutorial Chess Openings - Initial Position.