18. a4? is the losing move. After 18.Rad1 Qe5! Black is a little better but White is still very much in the game.

It is ridiculous to single out Bareev, or this game, for this fault. Other top players have had games in which they have lost in the opening.

For example:

A Zapata vs Anand, 1988

Deep Blue vs Kasparov, 1997

Anand vs Kramnik, 2005

<ToTheDeath> Young Bareev? The guy was 25 at that time. His opponent was officially the best player in the world at that age.

<In a "reversed opening", White plays an opening typically played by Black, but with colors reversed and thus an extra tempo.[111][112] Evans writes of such openings, "If a defense is considered good for Black, it must be even better for White with a move in hand."[113] Former World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik reportedly expressed the same view.[114][115] Watson questions this idea, citing Suba's thesis that Black, by moving second, has more complete information than White.[8] He writes, "everyone has such difficulties playing as White against a Sicilian Defence (1.e4 c5), but ... leading masters have no qualms about answering 1.c4 with 1...e5."[116] To explain this paradox, Watson discusses several different reversed Sicilian lines, showing how Black can exploit the disadvantages of various "extra" moves for White.[117] He concludes, "The point is, Black's set-up in the Sicilian is fine as a reactive system, but not worth much when trying to claim the initiative as White. This is true because Black is able to react to the specific plan White chooses; in Suba's terms, his information is indeed a move greater! Furthermore, he is able to take advantage of dead equal positions which White (hoping to retain the advantage of the first move) would normally avoid."[118]

Watson also observes, "Similarly, the Dutch Defence looks particularly sterile when White achieves the reversed positions a tempo up (it turns out that he has nothing useful to do!); and indeed, many standard Black openings are not very inspiring when one gets them as White, tempo in hand."[116] GM Alex Yermolinsky likewise notes that GM Vladimir Malaniuk, a successful exponent of the Leningrad Dutch (1.d4 f5 2.g3 g6) at the highest levels,[119][120] "once made a deep impression on me by casually dismissing someone's suggestion that he should try 1.f4 as White. He smiled and said, 'That extra move's gonna hurt me.' "[121]

Yermolinsky also agrees with Alekhine's criticism of 1.g3 e5 2.Nf3,[122] a reversed Alekhine's Defense, in Réti-Alekhine, Baden-Baden 1925,[123] writing that Alekhine "understood the difference in opening philosophies for White and Black, and realized they just can't be the same! White is supposed to try for more than just obtaining a comfortable game in reversed colour opening set-ups, and, as the statistics show—surprisingly for a lot of people, but not for me—White doesn't even score as well as Black does in the same positions with his extra tempo and all."[124] Howard Staunton, generally considered to have been the strongest player in the world from 1843 to 1851,[125][126][127] made a similar point over 160 years ago, writing that Owen's Defense (1.e4 b6) is playable for Black, but that 1.b3 is inferior to "the more customary [first] moves, from its being essentially defensive".[128]

Watson concludes that (a) "most moves have disadvantages as well as advantages, so an extra move is not always an unqualified blessing"; (b) "with his extra information about what White is doing, Black can better react to the new situation"; and (c) because a draw is likely to be more acceptable to Black than to White, White is apt to avoid lines that allow drawish simplifications, while Black may not object to such lines.[116]>