A Flohr Loss, Jerusalem, June 4th, 1934.

Salo Flohr. Credit: wikipedia commons.

As we have said before, Salo Flohr had visited Palestine in May-July 1934, and played quite a few simultaneous displays. We currently have a total of eight such displays, as well as a live game (against Marmorosh, which he won).

These simuls included, inter alia, a display against the 11 top players in the country -- including Czerniak, Dobkin, Winz, Mohilever, Blass, and others (source: Marmorosh's Davar chess column, July 13th, 1934, p. 9), scoring +9 =1 -1. As the opponents included a future IM (Czerniak), Olympiad players, and Palestine / Israel champions, this is a more than respectable score.

We have already communicated what we knew at the time about Flohr's visit to Edward Winter and in particular about the simul against the country's top players, based on Fasher's 1980 book (see C. N. 3962 for details), including Flohr's loss to Dobkin, but we now - checking the original sources - can tell that Fasher's data is slightly inaccurate, i.e., about the date of the 11-player simul. It took place July 7th, not June 2nd.

What's more, Marmorosh's column also gives another Flohr loss -- not only to Dobkin, but to  T. Segel from another simul, in Jerusalem. It is not a particularly good game, being an example of over-emphasizing the master's losses out of "local patritorism": White effortlessly refutes Black's dubious opening, gaining a pawn for nothing, but then blunders due to carelessness and reaches a strategically lost position. Nevertheless, the way Black exploits this advantage is instructive.

Flohr,Salo - Segel,T. [D08]

Simul, 4.6.1934, Jerusalem.

[Annotations: Marmorosh]

1.d4 d5 2.c4 e5 3.dxe5 d4 4.Nf3 Bb4+ 5.Bd2 Nc6 6.Bxb4 Nxb4 7.a3! [7.Nxd4?? Qxd4 wins a piece] 7...Nc6 8.b4 Bg4 9.Nbd2 Qe7 10.h3 Bd7 11.Nb3 Nxe5 12.Nxe5 Qxe5 13.Qxd4 White won a pawn and is winning. 13...Qg5 14.Nc5 0–0–0 15.Qd5? A gross blunder. 15...Qxd5 16.cxd5 Nf6 17.Rd1 b6 18.Nxd7 Rxd7 White cannot save the d5 pawn. 19.e3 Nxd5 20.Ba6+ Kb8 21.Bc4 Rhd8 22.0–0 f6 23.Rfe1 Nc3 24.Rxd7 Rxd7 25.Rc1 Rd1+! Black has good chances after the rook exchange. 26.Rxd1 Nxd1 27.Kf1 c6 28.Ke2 Nc3+ 29.Kd3 Nd1 30.Ke2 Nc3+ 31.Ke1 Kc7 32.f4 b5 33.Bd3 g6 34.Kd2 Na4 35.Bc2 Nb6 36.e4 Kd6 37.Bb3 Nd7 38.h4 c5 39.Bg8 h6 40.g4 g5 41.bxc5+ Nxc5 42.hxg5 hxg5 43.Ke3 Ne6! 44.f5 Nc5 45.Kd4 a5 46.Ba2 b4 47.axb4 axb4 48.Bc4 b3 49.Bd5 b2 50.Ba2 Nd7 51.Kc3 Ne5 52.Kxb2 Nxg4 53.Kc3 Ke5 54.Kd3 Nf2+ 55.Ke3 Nxe4 56.Bb1 Nd6 57.Kf3 Nxf5 58.Kg4 Nd6 59.Bc2 Ne4 60.Bb1 f5+ 61.Kh3 Kf4 62.Bc2 g4+ 63.Kg2 Ke3 White resigns (0–1).