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Geza Maroczy vs Savielly Tartakower
"Geza Stripped" (game of the day Sep-02-2008)
Teplitz-Schonau (1922), Teplice-Sanov CSR, rd 4, Oct-05
Dutch Defense: Rubinstein Variation (A84)  ·  0-1

ANALYSIS [x]

FEN COPIED

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Kibitzer's Corner
< Earlier Kibitzing  · PAGE 2 OF 4 ·  Later Kibitzing>
Dec-19-05  Professeur Y: This game will be commented by Dennis Monokrousos on the playchess server tonight.
Dec-19-05  Professeur Y: <Tartakower : « The judges awarded this game the third brilliancy prize, although a majority of them declared in peremptory fashion that such sacrifices are incalculable in advance in all their ramifications and that, in consequence, they deserve no encouragement. »> <Bronstein : « Tartakower only received the third brilliancy prize as the jury concluded that no human mind could calculate such a deep combination »>

In the pre-computer age, it seems that it was considered a bad thing to initiate a combination which could not be calculated to the end; the reasoning I guess was that there was an element of luck involved. Today it is the most valued kind of combination, because only humans are able to find them; computers just can’t, and the « luck » factor has been replaced with « intuition »… Interesting and subtle shift in opinion. Back then, chess players had to play as much as possible like machines; today we feel it is more deserving for them to play like humans.

Dec-19-05  Professeur Y: It is interesting to note that black gets three pawns for the rook, which does count for something, and then wins the exchange on move 25, which in fact reestablishes material equality only 7 moves after the sacrifice. When you consider with that the position of white’s king, deprived of its pawn shield, and of black’s remaining pieces hovering above its head, black’s advantage is obvious.
Jun-21-06  GeauxCool: Tartakower had an eclectic style and a great fondness for unusual variations, which he often regarded as a challenge to his opponents. -Fine

tactics - see Tartakower Vidmar Vienna 1906, not yet on Chessgames.


click for larger view

White on Move:

Tartakower's Tactical Solution:

1.e5!! Bxd3
2.e6!! Rxc3
3.bxc3 Qc7
4.Bd4 f6
5.gxf3 exf3
6.Bxf3 Qb2
7.Qh8+ Bxh8
8.Rxh8 mates with a rook, bishop and pawn.

May-04-07  PEANUTS: The critical line might be 21. Qc3 Nh5 22. Rg2 Qh4+ 23. Kg1 Ng3 24. Rh2 Qg5 25. Rf2 Nf5, when some (Nunn for instance) say White's position is hopeless, but 26. Nxe4 dxe4 27. d5 leads immediately to counterplay which need not favour Black. The prepatory 25.. Bd7 26. Bg2 Nf5 is similarly met by 27. Bxe4.
Sep-02-08
Premium Chessgames Member
  An Englishman: Good Evening: It is amazing that Tartakower sacrifices his Rook and has to take the time to complete his development. I especially like how he gets his QB into the game with ...e5.
Sep-02-08  dhotts: Can't white survive with an advantage with 25.Rg2........?
Sep-02-08  kellmano: Very surprised i have never seen this game before. It's quite brilliant. I really like it when sacrificial moves are followed up by slow-motion moves.

At move 19 you think 'there must be some way to remove the black queen from there', when black plays .....nf6. Same thing applies to black's 22nd.

Sep-02-08  Once: A great game. One of my all time favourites, but it's always a pleasure to revisit it.

White funnels all his pieces to the queenside, but never gets an attack going. Then he has to scurry back to the kingside to defend against Tartakower's sacrificial attack.

It's not as if Tartakower didn't signal his intentions from move two. The dutch cries out for a kingside attack, with the rook lift 0-0, Rf6, Rh6 being absolutely thematic.

Sep-02-08  crafty: 25. ♖g2 ♗c7 26. ♖e1 ♖f8 27. ♗c3 ♘g3 28. ♖h2   (eval 0.78; depth 16 ply; 10000M nodes)
Sep-02-08
Premium Chessgames Member
  chessgames.com: <dhotts: Can't white survive with an advantage with 25.Rg2........?> As you can see above, Crafty agrees with you, after pondering the position for 10 giganodes (that means she evaluated 10 billion positions to reach a conclusion). However, in such a volatile situation, even after that much computation the conclusion might be wrong.
Sep-02-08  YetAnotherAmateur: Could someone brighter than me come up with a good reason for 11. Bb2? All I can think of is that Maroczy is going for the standard fianchetto move, but that makes no sense to me in this situation due to the immobile d-pawn blocking in the bishop.

And later on the reason that's a bit of a problem becomes clear: it forces 22. Qd2 when that tempo is badly needed to shore up the kingside.

Sep-02-08
Premium Chessgames Member
  Phony Benoni: <YetAnotherAmateur> 11.Bb2 may look stupid, but what else is the bishop going to do? White won't be pushing his e-pawn anytime soon, so the bishop has no future on the kingside. 11.Bd2 doesn't look any more promising than 11.Bb2. White might consider 11.a4 and 12.Ba3 to try and trade it off, but Black can sidestep that easily enough.

With the bishop on b2, White is anticipating that Black may try to open the position with ...c5 or ...e5, when White can get his d-pawn out of the way. Things didn't work out as the game went, but it was probably the best idea at the time.

Sep-02-08  kevin86: Maroczy bound: white was beaten badly in this one.
Sep-02-08  Autoreparaturwerkbau: Gaza Strip - it's a geography term, so i like the pun.
Sep-02-08  TheaN: <YetAnotherAmateur&Phoni Benoni: Could someone brighter than me come up with a good reason for 11. Bb2? All I can think of is that Maroczy is going for the standard fianchetto move, but that makes no sense to me in this situation due to the immobile d-pawn blocking in the bishop.

PB: With the bishop on b2, White is anticipating that Black may try to open the position with ...c5 or ...e5, when White can get his d-pawn out of the way. Things didn't work out as the game went, but it was probably the best idea at the time.>

Actually, it seems White was trying a Colle-Zukertort-like setup, which completely drawbacks if White loses control over e4 or c4 (and thus with the Dutch). As this is the case at that move already for e4, White should've come up with something else, although I don't know what. White is already worse.

Sep-02-08  PinnedPiece: Why not
21. Rg2 where does the queen do better than ..Qxe3
22. Be2 does black have a better move than ...g3?
23. Nf1 and it looks like white will be ok, no?


click for larger view

Sep-02-08  Once: <PinnedPiece> A different way to play would be ...

21. Rg2 Qh6+ 22.Kg1 (forced) Qxe3+ 23. Kh1 Qh6+ 24. Kg1 (forced) Bf4 (threatening Be3+) 25. Re1


click for larger view

Black's pieces look to be well posted. The f4 bishop stops the white rooks from driving black's queen away. But I guess black has nothing more than a slight edge here. Fritz evaluates as -0.9.

Sep-02-08  Underworld: I really don't consider this all that big of a spectacle. It is a nice game with cool sacrifices, but it is what is expected out of a stonewall attack, which is what the dutch defense is when going on an attack. What I find most awesome about this game is only the year that it was played. This is the usual that I see when observing stonewall games.
Jul-27-10  muwatalli: <This is the usual that I see when observing stonewall games.> how many games have you seen in the stonewall variation of the dutch defense, 1?
Aug-13-10  sevenseaman: My gut feeling is Maroczy is a very good player. Sadly I've not yet come across a winning game of his. Some day!
Aug-13-10  Benzol: <sevenseamen> Have a look at

Maroczy vs Pillsbury, 1896

and

G Marco vs Maroczy, 1899

Apr-25-11  psmith: <dhotts>, <crafty>, <chessgames.com>

25. Rg2 Rf8 looks better than 25...Bc7 to me.

Jul-07-11
Premium Chessgames Member
  LIFE Master AJ: Tartakower's greatest brilliancy.
Feb-16-12
Premium Chessgames Member
  Penguincw: A rook sac with an eventual win.
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