1 sit down to face tal-general expectation- a gory loss embellished with tal -like sacrifices

2 he plays e4--i played the caro kann-it was my main defence at the time-i had just won the london under 18 championship and i had played it several times during that event-notably against kenny harman--i also played taimanov and lowenthal sicilians at the time but thought this might be too provocative against tal

3 10---nd5 instead 10--bd6 allows the famous nxe6 sacrifice fromtals first match against botvinnik which tal was still prepared to repeat in games as late as 1978. i wanted to avoid tals vastly superior knowledgew of this line so chose something to try and dampwn down whites attacking prospects.

4 11 qg4 this is the error altho it looks absolutely plausible. it was later discovered that 11 bxd5 cxd5 and now either qg4 or qh5 gives white a huge attack.

5 15 rad1 all this looks like vintage tal to keep blacks king stuck in the centre-and my next move looks like i am co-operating in my own demise by grabbing a hot pawn against tal of all people

6 15--bxc2 this almost seems like desperation but in fact i was no longer very worried-whites c pawn was a very useful unit and its loss now causes white problems-my main worry was that tal wd still find some way to sac on e6 and explode my position before i cd get castled

7 16--h5 a decoy to gain time after 17nxh5 bg6 18nf4 bf5-tal hardly even thought about taking the pawn and slowing down-he kept his queen fixed on e6 where he clearly still wanted to sacrifice

8 19 rd7 the only way forwards now, but blacks position is secure

9 21---kxd7 so it has come to pass and black never got castled-white now also starts to rip up the black kings side-but i was happy-two rooks for a queen and the bishop pair and soon some open lines too

10 25--bd2 now i knew i had him on the run-tal thought for a while and gave up his knight

11 28 ---be4 defending and attacking-whites threats are now illusory

12 30..bh2+ a sac finishes white off-i was very pleased of course to beat tal in a war of movement -not just by simul induced blunders--and i felt the choice of opening had been psychologically a good one-i was fortunate tho that tal did not discover the probable refutation of blacks inovation with 11 bxd5.