Larsen in action: A story of crime and (well-deserved) punishment
In tonight's issue of Chess Today, some games were included from a tournament in Argentina, and to my surprise Bent Larsen was included among the participants. Larsen, as many of you probably remember, was one of the world's best players in the 1960s and '70s and remained an elite player into the 80s as well. He's in his 70s now and doesn't play that much any more, but it's still nice to see him in action. Or rather, it was, until I saw what he was playing:
Round 1: Larsen (2461) - Dos Santos (2435): 1.g4.
Round 2: Mahia (2441) - Larsen (2461) 1.d4 c5 2.d5 e5 3.Nc3 h5.
Round 3: Larsen (2461) - Lemos (2479) 1.b4 e5 2.Bb2 Bxb4 3.Bxe5 Nf6 4.h4.
Round 4: Contin (2304) - Larsen (2461) 1.e4 a5
Round 5: Larsen (2461) - Liascovich (2435) 1.b4 e5 2.Bb2 Bxb4 3.Bxe5 Nf6 4.c3 Be7 5.h4 Nc6 6.Bh2.
Larsen was a great player, and in his prime he might very well have gone 5-0 against these opponents. But even so, why play like this? Why treat your opponent like he's a [donkey]? I can't understand why one of the all-time greats would do this - is it something special for a legend to humiliate a 2304 player by beating him with 1.e4 a5?
Happily, we won't get to find out. Contin DESTROYED Larsen in that game; in fact, all his opponents won. The author of today's Chess Today called Larsen's 0-5 start unfortunate, but I couldn't disagree more. It's one thing to play like this in blitz, goofing around out at the local club or on the internet (especially when one has "the hate"). But for a living legend to do this in a slow tournament? He can do whatever he wants to, but if he's going to play like this, I'm going to take delight in all the severe beatings over the board he gets.
As for those who want to invoke the 1.e4 a6 of Karpov-Miles, I think that gets it backward. Miles was an underdog with a horrible record against Karpov, and was doing something desperate to stop the negative trend. Larsen is in the bully role, not that of the gritty underdog. And if his goal was to avoid heavy theory, surely there were easier and sounder ways to do it than that!
Having been rather hard on Larsen in this post, let me say three things on his behalf. First, he is or at least was a great writer on the game, and if you can find his book of selected games at a non-lethal price, it's worth your time and money. The book is a terrific read. Second, he has always been somewhat avant-garde in his chess, though never anywhere near this far during his active days. But charitably, we can see his openings here as an extreme caricature of his normal chess. And third, at least he's not playing the Latvian!
(You can replay two of his thrashings here.)
Round 1: Larsen (2461) - Dos Santos (2435): 1.g4.
Round 2: Mahia (2441) - Larsen (2461) 1.d4 c5 2.d5 e5 3.Nc3 h5.
Round 3: Larsen (2461) - Lemos (2479) 1.b4 e5 2.Bb2 Bxb4 3.Bxe5 Nf6 4.h4.
Round 4: Contin (2304) - Larsen (2461) 1.e4 a5
Round 5: Larsen (2461) - Liascovich (2435) 1.b4 e5 2.Bb2 Bxb4 3.Bxe5 Nf6 4.c3 Be7 5.h4 Nc6 6.Bh2.
Larsen was a great player, and in his prime he might very well have gone 5-0 against these opponents. But even so, why play like this? Why treat your opponent like he's a [donkey]? I can't understand why one of the all-time greats would do this - is it something special for a legend to humiliate a 2304 player by beating him with 1.e4 a5?
Happily, we won't get to find out. Contin DESTROYED Larsen in that game; in fact, all his opponents won. The author of today's Chess Today called Larsen's 0-5 start unfortunate, but I couldn't disagree more. It's one thing to play like this in blitz, goofing around out at the local club or on the internet (especially when one has "the hate"). But for a living legend to do this in a slow tournament? He can do whatever he wants to, but if he's going to play like this, I'm going to take delight in all the severe beatings over the board he gets.
As for those who want to invoke the 1.e4 a6 of Karpov-Miles, I think that gets it backward. Miles was an underdog with a horrible record against Karpov, and was doing something desperate to stop the negative trend. Larsen is in the bully role, not that of the gritty underdog. And if his goal was to avoid heavy theory, surely there were easier and sounder ways to do it than that!
Having been rather hard on Larsen in this post, let me say three things on his behalf. First, he is or at least was a great writer on the game, and if you can find his book of selected games at a non-lethal price, it's worth your time and money. The book is a terrific read. Second, he has always been somewhat avant-garde in his chess, though never anywhere near this far during his active days. But charitably, we can see his openings here as an extreme caricature of his normal chess. And third, at least he's not playing the Latvian!
(You can replay two of his thrashings here.)
Posted by Dennis Monokroussos on
Saturday October 4, 2008 at 10:29pm
You would think Larsen's dignity had to take one serious hit with those scores, and hopefully it will discourage him from trying that again.
Just my two cents on it.
1) He played off beat stuff even against the best players in his prime, maybe not this off beat, but still trying to keep away from the heavily analyzed stuff the main competitors of his era were using.
2) He always had a big ego. Remember he insisted on playing 1st board over Fischer for the 1970 USSR vs The World match.
Inky: Who is Bent "Larson"? Anyway, I want him to have all the dignity 1...a5 merits.
M. Nieuweboer: I've never heard that about Miles' 1...a6 - everything I recall about that indicates that it was completely intentional. Maybe he was kidding around with someone to exaggerate the feat?