Mashian Annotates

 A frequent correspondent notes that Ya'akov Mashian, 'Persian Champion 1958', had arrived in Israel in 1958 and immediately began to be involved in the chess life of the country. One example is him annotating, in Davar's chess column (ed. Zalman Gurevich) the game Van den Berg - Szabo from the 1958 international tournament in Israel. Here is the game (Davar, Nov. 14th, 1958, p. 10): 

Van den Berg - Szabo 

Ruy Lopez [C89]

1958 International Tournament, Tel Aviv/Haifa, rd. 13

Source: see above

Annotator: Ya'akov Mashian

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Ba4 Nf6 5. O-O Be7 6. Re1 b5 7. Bb3 O-O 8. c3 Better is 8. a4 since after} Bb7 9. d3 $1 d6 10. Nc3 b4 11. Ne2! White has better chances. 8... d5 9. exd5 e4 There is another way, as in Capablanca-Marshall, which is better for White: 9... Nxd5 10. Nxe5 Nxe5 11. Rxe5 Nf6 12. d4 Bd6 13. Re2!, defending against Black's KS pressure. 10.dxc6 If 10. Ng5 Bg4 11. f3 exf3 12. Nxf3 Nxd5 13. d4 10... exf3 11. Qxf3 Bg4 12. Qg3 Bd6 12... Re8 Doesn't do much for Black:13. d4 Bd6 14. Rxe8+ Qxe8 15. Qe3 Qxc6 16. f3 Re8 17. Qf2. 13. f4 Re8 14. Re5? A mistake! This move was played before by masters, but only this time the Hungarian grandmaster manages to exploit the mistake. Correct was 14. d4 Nh5 15. Rxe8+ Qxe8 16. Qf2 Qxc6 17. Be3 Re8 and Black doesn't have enough initiative for the pawn.

14... Bxe5!! 15. fxe5 Nh5 16. Qxg4 Rxe5 17. Na3 White has no stronger move. For example: 17. d4 Re1+ 18. Kf2 Nf6 19. Qf4 Qe7 20. Be3 Rxe3 21. Qxe3 Ng4+  wins the queen. 17... Re1+ 18. Kf2 Nf6 19. Qf4 19. Qf3 Rxc1 and wins (due to 20. Rxc1 Qxd2+ - A. P.) 19... Qe7 20. Qf3 Rh1 21. Nc2 Ne4+ 22. Ke2 Nxc3+ 23. Kd3 Rd8+ 24. Nd4 Ne2 White resigns (0-1)

Simul Results

The Medal of the 1964 Olympiad. Credit: Wikipedia.

We have already mentioned the simultaneous displays the USSR team gave in Israel in 1964 here, here, and here. We is some more information about simuls games, from the same source (Herut, 4.12.1964, p. 7) mentioned in the last post, with date when available. The last link, noting Smyslov's exhibition in Rishon Le'Tziyon, reports slightly different results (+37 =5 -2) than the one's reported in Herut. Presumably the latter, higher figure which represents more complete results. 

Szabo (Hungary):

Tel Aviv University, 30.11, +28 =3 -2. 

Lehavot Ha'Bashan, +20 =1.

Kfar Masarik, +23 =3 -1.

Petrosian:

Bat Yam, 28.11, +7 =2 -1 ("against top players.")

Smyslov: 

Bar Ilan University, 27.11, +29 =8 -3

Rishon Le'Tziyon, 28.11, +32 =6 -2 

Botvinnik: 

Holon, 27.11, +21 =4 ("an excellent result.")

Candid Photos from the Tel-Aviv / Haifa 1958 International Tournament

Details: see below

Ami Barav, Israel Rabinovich-Barav's son, kindly provided us with the following photos he took, as a young boy, of the players in the international tournament that took place in Tel Aviv and Haifa in 1958. They are from the 13th round. The photos show, from top to bottom, White mentioned first:

Arie Rosenberg thinking in his game against Sylvain Burstein (who later changed his name, as noted by a correpondent below, to Inbar). 

Israel Dyner playing Itzchak Aloni

Laslo Szabo playing Samuel Reshevsky

Carel Van den Berg playing Yosef Porat.

Jozsef Hajtun

Jozsef Hajtun. Credit: www.chessbase.com 's players' Encyclopedia.

Readers, even those who are knowledgeable about chess in Israel or the British Mandate of Palestine, may well wonder who is Jozsef Hajtun, who we mentioned in the previous item. 

Our frequent correspondent (also mentioned in the previous item...) adds that he was reported in the Israeli press as participating in the Hungarian championship of 1951 (11th place, 11/21 -- behind, we add, notables such as Barcza, Szabo, Gereben, Benko, and Florian), as well as editing Kol Ha'Am's chess column. 

A search of Chessbase's Players' Encyclopedia finds him participating in six Hungarian championships, usually ending in the middle of the crosstable, but also winning a small tournament, the Gecsei memorial, in Pecs, Hungary, in 1955.

We add that -- as checking the blog for their names shows -- Szabo played in Israel in the 1958 international tournament (coming second after Reshevsky) and Gereben even emigrated to Israel for a while, before moving to Switzerland. 

Najdorf's Last Serious Game -- Analyzed by Najdorf

Yochanan Afek had sent me material he had received from Herbert Perez-Garcia, who interviewed the participants of the 1996 Groningen tournament -- the 50th anniversary tournament of the 1946 Groningen event, which was the first postwar international tournament. The contestants in 1996 included all the survivors: Guimand, Smyslov, Najdorf, Denker, Szabo, Christoffel, and Yanofsky. Of these, four (Najdorf, Denker, Szabo and Yanofsky) were Jews. All players involved had died in the meantime.

The videos are quite interesting, showing how, even in extreme old age, these men found great enjoyment in chess, and also in post-mortem analysis. All the videos are available here (mostly in Spanish, but some in English). The most interesting one where Najdorf analyzes the last serious game he played -- appropriately, a victory, over Denker: