Remembering the Golden Oldies: Bronstein & Geller

On the ChessCafe website, they've reposted a 1999 article by Lev Khariton celebrating David Bronstein's 75 birthday. Bronstein has since passed away, but he will, or at least should, be long remembered by chess fans. Those already familiar with Bronstein will enjoy the article, while those who aren't are even more strongly encouraged to have a look.

I also see on the ChessCafe website that Wednesday (as of this writing, that's today for some of you, tomorrow for the rest of us) would have been Efim Geller's 86th birthday. Like Bronstein, he was one of the absolutely greatest players never to become world champion. How great was Geller? He played more than two hundred games with world champions from Euwe to Kasparov, and had an overall plus score. If you're not familiar with Geller, then have a look at his Wikipedia page and check out the games and links.

This Week's ChessVideos Show: The Bronstein Piece Sac

In the game Bronstein-Rojahn, from the 1956 Olympics in Moscow, the legendary grandmaster playing White came up with this startling idea agains the Two Knights: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.d3 h6 7.Nf3 e4 8.dxe4?!! On balance, the sac is unsound here, but the idea is a good one. For a piece White gets two pawns and a powerful pawn center that keeps Black bottled up. Rojahn was unable to solve his problems, and Bronstein went on to win a nice game.

This kind of pawn sac is the theme for the show, and I cover this game in more detail, along with a couple of other ones. (Including a sounder sac by the very same David Bronstein.) Have a look here - the show is free (free registration required), and will be available on demand for the next month.