Nezhmetdinovs Best Games Of Chess

From the publisher:

&#;Rashid Nezhmetdinov () played fearless attacking chess. With his dazzling style, the Soviet master already was a legend during his lifetime, but international fame largely eluded him. Only once did he get permission to show his exceptional talent in a tournament abroad. Five times Nezhmetdinov was chess champion of the Russian Federation. In the Soviet Championship, he won the &#;Best Game&#; prize for a spectacular win against Mikhail Tal who praised his opponent for his &#;amazing creativity.&#; Other stars that &#;Nezh&#; defeated in grand style included Spassky, Polugaevsky, Bronstein, and Geller.

His games, full of tactical pyrotechnics, are his legacy and have reached an ever-growing audience. Nezhmetdinov&#;s shocking strategic queen sacrifice, in against Chernikov, as shown on Agadmator&#;s YouTube channel, has become the best-watched chess video of all time with millions of views. In this book, Cyrus Lakdawala pays tribute to the genius of the enigmatic Nezhmetdinov, a Tatar who grew up as an orphan in the part of the Soviet Union that is now Kazakhstan.

In more than one hundred impressive and instructive games and positions, Lakdawala shows how Nezhmetdinov fought for the initiative, how he bluffed and sacrificed, and how he kept his cool to out-calculate his opponents. Lakdawala&#;s lucid writing perfectly matches the power of &#;Nezh&#;s&#; moves. This wonderful collection celebrates Nezhmetdinov as the Greatest Attacker in Chess.&#;

Cyrus Lakdawala is an International Master who lives in San Diego, CA. He has been teaching chess for four decades and is a prolific and widely read author. Much acclaimed books of his are How Ulf Beats Black, Clinch It! and Winning Ugly in Chess. He twice won the Best Instructional Book Award of the Chess Journalists of America (CJA), in for Chess for Hawks and in for In the Zone: The Greatest Winning Streaks in Chess History.

We all know and love the games of the great world champions, but there are also a few players who, while not reaching the summit, have become cult figures amongst chess fans for their creativity, imagination and brilliance.

Albin Planinc is one, and another is Rashid Nezhmetdinov, the subject of this book. He has been the subject of several books over the years, and now the prolific Cyrus Lakdawala adds his name to the lists.

Here&#;s Lakdawala in his Preface:

If you asked the question &#;Who do you believe was the most tactically creative player of the 20th century?&#; then I&#;m guessing that most chess players would pick either Alekhine, Bronstein, Tal or Kasparov.  Now we have a new potential entry for the top spot: Rashid Nezhmetdinov. Why are so many people irrestistibly drawn to Mikhail Tal&#;s chess games? The spirit of Nezhmetdinov the pirate lived on in his friend&#;s games. Tal was merely a more powerful extension of Nezhmetdinov. Nezhmetdinov was Tal&#;s trainer and muse in his successful bid to dethrone Botvinnik as World Champion. Tal explained that Nezhmetdinov taught him &#;paradox&#;, taking risk-taking to previously unheard-of levels. Then Tal, his stylistic offspring, displayed to the world the power of this radical new style, when in he defeated the great Mikhail Botvinnik in a match for the World Championship. If you love Tal&#;s games, then by default you will automatically love Nezhmetdinov&#;s.

Who doesn&#;t love Tal&#;s games? Book collectors who enjoy brilliant tactics and sacrifices will surely have several collections of Tal&#;s games on their shelves. They&#;ll really need a collection of Nezhmetdinov&#;s games as well. Is this the right one for you?

If you&#;ve read other books by Cyrus Lakdawala, you&#;ll know what to expect. His, shall we say, picturesque style of writing divides the critics. There are those who find his friendly approach and sometimes outrageous metaphors draw them in, and others who find this distracts them from the chess. You pay your money, or not, as the case may be, and take your choice.

The annotations, as is customary with this author, feature Moments of Contemplation, where you&#;re encouraged to think about the position, and Exercises, split into Planning, Combination Alert and Critical Decisions, inviting you to guess the next move. There are also Principles (in italics) offering you nuggets of general advice. All this will help less experienced readers navigate their way through the book and gain tangible benefits which they&#;ll be able to employ in their own games.

Here&#;s an early game. Click on any move for a pop-up window.

This is one of his most famous victories &#; against a formidable opponent. If you haven&#;t seen it before, do take a look.

The ChessBase score concludes here. Lakdawala adds the moves Ka6 Ndb4#, commenting, in typical style: This is an overkill on par with Rasputin&#;s murder, where the unlucky monk was stabbed, shot, poisoned, bludgeoned, and then, for good measure, drowned.

Your opinion of the book will depend on how you react to this sort of thing. Here are another couple of examples.

Everyone knows that the Dragon, much the same as a Bond villain babe, is simultaneously beautiful and dangerous.

You are on trial for your life for a murder you committed in front of a police station and 30 witnesses, most of whom recorded you with their cell phone video cameras. Your victim fought back and your blood was found on her and on the knife you used to stab her. I just described Aronin&#;s position&#;s chance of being found Not Guilty by the jury. 

You might enjoy them. You might be prepared to live with them even though you think they&#;re both irrelevant and bordering on tasteless, and that the publisher might have made more use of the Delete key. Or you might decide there&#;s no way you&#;d buy a book written like that. Me, I&#;m in the middle camp, as I am with most things.

In this game from towards the end of his career he defeats a future world champion.

Even if you don&#;t care for Lakdawala&#;s prose, you should admire his hard work and enthusiasm. He knows his audience, knows exactly what he&#;s doing and has perfected his art over many years. You may well think that his colourful annotations are a perfect match for Nezhmetdinov&#;s colourful chess.

For many readers, this will be a hugely enjoyable read, and one which may also take their play to new levels of creativity. You&#;ll find &#;games&#; (about half complete games &#; not all won by Nezhmetdinov &#; and the others just conclusions) against many of the Soviet greats of the time: Bronstein, Tal, Korchnoi and others. As you&#;ve seen, the book is a cornucopia of daring attacks and sacrifices, not all of which are completely sound. The book is produced to New in Chess&#;s customary high standards and can be highly recommended to anyone not put off by the author&#;s writing style.

You can read some sample pages on the publisher&#;s website here.

Richard James, Twickenham 30th September

Book Details:

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• Publisher: New In chess (25 Feb. )
• Language: English
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Although Rashid Nezhmetdinov () was not widely known in the West, his games have a great reputation among connoisseurs of attacking play. Among his many distinctions in chess are his score of six wins, nine draws and five losses against World Champions.

As former World Champion Mikhail Tal wrote: ``With the passage of time tournament tables tend to lose interest, but some games played in these tournaments live forever, and in this respect Nezhmetdinov is one of the most richly endowed players. I have played four games with the Tator master and the score is in his favor.``

David Bronstein too, sang his prasises:
``Rashid Nezhmetdinov is a virtuoso of combinational chess.!

Both Tal and Bronstein acclaimed the Russian editions of this work, now translated into English for the first time. Containing over of Nezhmetdinov`s best games with his own annotations, this book will be welcomed by all lovers of imaginative chess.

Rashid Gibiatovich Nezhmetdinov was born in Aktubinsk, then part of the Russian Empire and now known as Aqtöbe, in Kazakhstan, into a poor peasant family of Tatar ethnicity. Orphaned when very young, he moved to Kazan in the Republic of Tatarstan at a young age under the care of his brother, and it was there that he learned chess by watching local games despite living for some time in great hardship.

He also became a renowned checkers (draughts) player, but it was chess that he turned to after leaving military service after the end of World War II. Notwithstanding this, when the Russian Checkers Semifinals were held in Kazan, Nezhmetdinov agreed to substitute for a player who didn't show up even though he hadn't played checkers for 15 years. He finished 12/16 without losing a game, earning the title of Soviet Master of Checkers. This also qualified him for the finals, where he finished 2nd.

Nezhmetdinov's participation in chess tournaments before World War II was intermittent. In at the age of 15, he played in Kazan's Tournament of Pioneers (an 18 and under event), winning all 15 games. In he won the junior section of the Kazan city championship, and the next year he finished first in the overall Kazan championship and earned a Category I rating. Nezhmetdinov earned the Candidate Master title by winning the All-Union Tournament at Rostov-on-Don in , finishing undefeated with a 9/10 score. In , Rashid was called to military service and stationed in Baikal, where he won the district chess tournament over some strong opposition, including Victor Davidovich Baturinsky and Konstantin Klaman.

After the War, when he dedicated himself to chess, he came 1st in a tournament organised within the Soviet Military Administration in Berlin, , triumphing over future Master and Ukrainian champion Isaac Lipnitsky. After he demobilised in , he began a long and distinguished career, starting with 2nd place in the final of the Russian Federation (RSFSR) Championship behind Nikolay Novotelnov. Later that year Nezhmetdinov finished =2nd in an All-Union Candidate Master tournament, earning him the right to play a classification match in against Vladas Mikenas for the title of Soviet Master. He drew the match (+=6), but did not gain the coveted Master title, because the examiner got draw odds. Two years later, in , he won the Russian Federation Chess Championship against a very strong field and finally earned the Master title. He won the Russian Championship four more times: in ahead of Nikolai Krogius, in ahead of Lev Polugaevsky, in ahead of Boris T Vladimirov, and in in Sochi ahead of Viktor Korchnoi. In Sochi Nezhmetdinov played his immortal game against Lev Polugaevsky Other excellent results in the RSFSR Championships included 2nd in behind Leonid Alexandrovich Shamkovich, =2nd in behind Shamkovich and alongside Krogius and Polugaevsky, and clear 2nd in behind Polugaevsky after a playoff mini-match against Vladimir Antoshin, Anatoly Lein, and Lev A Belov to earn a spot in the finals of the USSR Championship. He also finished =3rd in behind Lein and Georgy Ilivitsky.

Nezhmetdinov was also a regular participant in the USSR Championship cycles in their various incarnations, consistently participating in the quarter and semi finals eliminations for the USSR Championship between and His best results were =1st with Isaac Boleslavsky and Vitaly Georgievich Tarasov at the semi-final, and =1st with Boris Spassky at the semi-final. He made it to the finals of five USSR Championships, with his best result coming in Kiev where he finished =7th with victories over Efim Geller, Salomon Flohr, and Andre Lilienthal. He also did well against Grandmaster competition in the Moscow edition, scoring /3 against three future world champions, drawing with Tigran Vartanovich Petrosian and beating Spassky and Mikhail Tal.

In , accompanying Soviet Masters Korchnoi, Semyon Abramovich Furman and Ratmir Kholmov, Nezhmetdinov participated in the Bucharest International tournament, one of only three times he played outside the USSR. He rose to the occasion, defeating International Masters Miroslav Filip, Robert Wade, Bogdan Sliwa, and Grandmaster Gideon Stahlberg. He won the tournament brilliancy prize against Enrico Paoli, and finished clear second behind Korchnoi. In recognition of this performance, later that year FIDE awarded him the International Master title. Results in other tournaments include =2nd behind Mark Taimanov at the Chigorin Memorial and 3rd at the Baku International in behind Antoshin and Vladimir Bagirov. He participated in the Soviet Club Championships in , and , winning individual and team silver for his team DSO Spartak in on board 6, individual and team gold for Spartak in on board 5, and individual gold on board 6 for Spartak in He was also a member of the RSFSR Team that played matches with other Soviet Republics, with his best result coming at Vilnius where he played board 1 for the RSFSR and led them to a 3rd place finish, and also took the individual bronze medal ahead of Paul Keres, David Bronstein, Efim Geller, and Boleslavsky. In Nezhmetdinov played his last tournament, placing only 3rd behind a weak field in the Latvian Open. He fell ill and did not finish all of his games. However, he did win his last brilliancy prize in his game against Vladimir I Karasev.

Nezhmetdinov was renowned for his imaginative attacking style. His famous and widely published game at Sochi against Polugaevsky is considered to be one of the best attacking games of the 20th century. He assisted Tal in preparation for the latter's World Championship match against Mikhail Botvinnik. While he beat many of the world's top players, he was never awarded the GM title even though he won 5 Russian Championships. Nezhmetdinov published an autobiography including his best games entitled Nezhmetdinov's Best Games of Chess (republished by Caissa Editions in ). Alex Pishkin published a similar tome entitled Super Nezh, Chess Assassin in

Nezhmetdinov passed away in Kazan in

Sources

Russian tournament and match archive: funduszeue.info; Photo of bust of Nezhmetdinov in Kazan: funduszeue.info; Bust and plaque on a building: funduszeue.info; <jessicafischerqueen>'s three-part YouTube documentary: funduszeue.info?lis with addendum at Rashid Gibiatovich Nezhmetdinov

*Polugaevsky vs Nezhmetdinov,

Wikipedia article: Rashid Nezhmetdinov

Samsonov vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C29) Vienna Gambit, 15 moves,

N Kosolapov vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C46) Three Knights, 24 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs P Ermolin,  
(B71) Sicilian, Dragon, Levenfish Variation, 15 moves,

Kholmov vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(A46) Queen's Pawn Game, 61 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs V Baskin,  
(C55) Two Knights Defense, 27 moves,

Lilienthal vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(A54) Old Indian, Ukrainian Variation, funduszeue.info3, 28 moves,

K Klaman vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C27) Vienna Game, 26 moves,

V Zak vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(A62) Benoni, Fianchetto Variation, 28 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Estrin,  
(C92) Ruy Lopez, Closed, 30 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Aronin,  
(A07) King's Indian Attack, 32 moves,

M Shishov vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C91) Ruy Lopez, Closed, 42 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Shamkovich,  
(B94) Sicilian, Najdorf, 34 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs E Paoli,  
(B95) Sicilian, Najdorf, e6, 27 moves,

V Ciocaltea vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C59) Two Knights, 27 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Geller,  
(A04) Reti Opening, 46 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Shamkovich,  
(B30) Sicilian, 30 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs G Borisenko,  
(C79) Ruy Lopez, Steinitz Defense Deferred, 46 moves,

N Aratovsky vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(A53) Old Indian, 36 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Kasparian,  
(B11) Caro-Kann, Two Knights, Bg4, 47 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs A Matskevich,  
(B01) Scandinavian, 44 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs I Zilber, 
(B60) Sicilian, Richter-Rauzer, 46 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs A Chistiakov,  
(C12) French, McCutcheon, 31 moves,

B Gurgenidze vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C77) Ruy Lopez, 28 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Tal,  
(C17) French, Winawer, Advance, 32 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Spassky,  
(B31) Sicilian, Rossolimo Variation, 33 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Y Kotkov,  
(C67) Ruy Lopez, 25 moves,

Polugaevsky vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(A54) Old Indian, Ukrainian Variation, funduszeue.info3, 33 moves,

Shamkovich vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(E97) King's Indian, 33 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Tal,  
(B84) Sicilian, Scheveningen, 29 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs O Chernikov,  
(B32) Sicilian, 33 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs V Zagorovsky,  
(C90) Ruy Lopez, Closed, 43 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Ujtumen,  
(C97) Ruy Lopez, Closed, Chigorin, 35 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs V Sergievsky,  
(B43) Sicilian, Kan, funduszeue.info3, 20 moves,

V Timofeev vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(E67) King's Indian, Fianchetto, 29 moves,

L Belov vs R Nezhmetdinov,  
(C59) Two Knights, 31 moves,

R Nezhmetdinov vs Romanov,  
(B88) Sicilian, Fischer-Sozin Attack, 28 moves,

36 games