The Great Rook to e4 Debate
by Gilbert Palmer
I have been reading / studying
"Secrets of Modern Chess Strategy" by IM John Watson, I am enjoying it
immensely, Mr.Watson knows a lot about chess, a lot more than I do anyway, no doubt about
that at all. Much of the chess theory presented by IM Watson is original.
If the theory of chess was regarded
as the blood circulation, I would say that GM Nimzowich explained the role of the heart,
World Champion Euwe got down to detailed work on the arteries, and now IM Watson seems to
be working on the veins of chess theory.
Watson gives value for money here
there are concepts so complicated that I have never heard of them. However one complaint:
Watson does not even mention any contribution to the THE GREAT ROOK TO e4 DEBATE so I have
decided to add to the THEORY of chess myself and tackle this subject:
GM Nimzowich: The Heart
World Champion Euwe: The Arteries
IM Watson: The Veins
Idiot Gilbert Palmer is down there at the capillary level.....
ROOKS AND CENTRAL SQUARES
Rooks (as most of you will probably
know) start their lives on the squares a1, h1, a8 and h8. The central squares are of
course e4, d4, e5 and d5.
Getting rooks into the game quickly
and effectively are not the same thing, however every beginner passes through a stage when
he realises that while rooks are peculiar in that they are the only piece which controls
exactly the same amount of squares from anywhere on the board (14 squares - everywhere
whether a8 or e4) rooks in the middle of the board can be quite stunning.
In this FIRST part (of EIGHT) of my
survey I will examine the occupation of the e4 square by a white rook.
Now you might be thinking what? Why?
Well, if Nimzowich can discuss
overprotection, Euwe queen side majorities and Watson can discuss "The bishop pair
reconsidered" I sure as hell think that Palmer should be permitted to discuss white
rooks getting to e4 in very few moves.
It is chess theory.
Anyway, I digress: getting a rook to
e4 can be a slow business: for example: In the Mammoth Book Of The World's Greatest Chess
Games (Burgess, Dr.John Nunn and John Emms) the earliest a rook lands of e4 is on the 22nd
in the game Adams - Torre (game 16 page 91). As there are 100 games in this book, you can
take it that 22 moves is very few for the occupation of e4 by a rook:
But now let's consider the
contribution made to this branch of chess theory by the greatest players - the WORLD
CHAMPIONS: THE RECORD IN A WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH The earliest Rook on the e4 square in
a World Championship MATCH was by William Steinitz who managed to get a rook to the e4
square on the 12th move, (it didn't do him much good he lost):
Steinitz W - Lasker Em [C54/03] 3
Moscow, WCH, 1896 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4 exd4 6.cxd4 Bb4+ 7.Nc3 Nxe4
8.0-0 Bxc3 9.bxc3 d5 10.Ba3 dxc4 11.Re1 Be6?? 12.Rxe4 0-1 in 39 moves.
Lasker himself played a rook to e4
quite a few times and more of this later:
CANDIDATES - EUWE HOLDS RECORD
When we consider World Champions
participating in a Candidates cycle, Euwe produced an eleven move occupations of the e4
square by his rook in the following game:
Euwe M - Bronstein D [A97/06] 21
Zuerich, ct, 1953 1.d4 e6 2.c4 f5 3.g3 Nf6 4.Bg2 Be7 5.Nf3 0-0 6.0-0 d6 7.Nc3 Qe8 8.Re1
Qg6 9.e4 Nxe4 10.Nxe4 fxe4 11.Rxe4 ½-½ in 28 moves
BOBBY FISCHER
Bobby Fischer equalled eleven moves
in the following game from the famous Bled Tournament:
Fischer,R - Trifunovic,P [C80] Bled
Rd:, 1961 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Nxe4 6.d4 b5 7.Bb3 exd4 8.Re1 d5
9.Nc3 Be6 10.Nxe4 dxe4 11.Rxe4 1-0 73 moves
POST FISCHER
If we talk of MODERN chess, Karpov
does not do too badly although nowhere near as entertaining as the above, although not in
a candidates: Karpov's earliest occupation of the e4 square was funnily enough against a
computer:
Karpov Anatoli - COMP Mephisto III
[C67/02] Hannover, 1983 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.0-0 Nxe4 5.d4 exd4 6.Re1 f5 7.Nxd4
Nxd4 8.Qxd4 Kf7 9.Bc4+ d5 10.Bxd5+ Be6 11.Bxe6+ Kxe6 12.Rxe4+ ½-½
Against a human being Karpov's best
was a rather poor 25 moves in a blitz game:
Karpov Anatoly - Salov Valery
[A46/02] It (blitz), Alma-Ata (Kazakhstan), 1995 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 d6 3.Nbd2 Bg4 4.e4 Nbd7
5.c3 e6 6.h3 Bh5 7.Bd3 Be7 8.0-0 0-0 9.Re1 c6 10.Nf1 d5 11.Ng3 Bg6 12.Bf4 dxe4 13.Nxe4
Nxe4 14.Bxe4 Bxe4 15.Rxe4 ½-½ 38 moves.
KASPAROV
The strongest player in chess
history is Kasparov, you would have thought his name would loom large in any discussion of
the World Champions. Unfortunately Kasparov does not do well in this survey: as far as I
am aware must have been absolutely amazed to see a rook on e4 in the 17th move in his game
v Fritz 3 in 1994, in all of the many thousands of games Kasparov has played (and I have)
a rook ever reached e4 in so few moves:
Fritz3 - Kasparov Garry [B13/07] It
(blitz) (playoff), Munich (Germany), 1994 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.c4 Nf6 5.cxd5 Nxd5
6.Nc3 e6 7.Nf3 Be7 8.Bc4 Nxc3 9.bxc3 Qc7 10.Qd3 0-0 11.0-0 Nd7 12.Bg5 Bxg5 13.Nxg5 Nf6
14.Rae1 Bd7 15.Bb3 h6 16.Ne4 Nxe4 17.Rxe4 ½-½ 47 moves
The earliest Kasparov himself has
ever managed to get a rook on to the e4 square is a quite PATHETIC 19 moves, he has done
this three times, this being the earliest:
Kasparov Garry - Van der Wiel,J
[E12/02] Graz, 1981 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.a3 c5 5.d5 Ba6 6.Qc2 Qe7 7.Bg5 exd5 8.Nc3
Bxc4 9.e4 h6 10.Bxf6 Qxf6 11.exd5 Bxf1 12.Kxf1 d6 13.Re1+ Be7 14.Ne4 Qg6 15.Qa4+ Kf8 16.h4
Qf5 17.Qd1 Na6 18.Ng3 Qd7 19.Re4 1-0 in 52 moves
Very strangely it was against the
very same opponent some six years later that Kasparov did it again:
Kasparov Garry - Van der Wiel,J
[E63/02] Brussels (8), 1987 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nf3 Bg7 4.g3 0-0 5.Bg2 d6 6.0-0 Nc6 7.Nc3
a6 8.Bg5 Rb8 9.Rc1 Bg4 10.d5 Bxf3 11.exf3 Ne5 12.Qe2 Re8 13.Rfe1 c5 14.dxc6 Nxc6 15.Rcd1
h6 16.Bc1 Nd7 17.f4 Nd4 18.Qd2 Qa5 19.Re4 1-0 42 moves
(Stop press: According to the
magazine "Chess" which had a reference to this article in its pages Kasparov has
put a rook on e4 in 12 moves in a simul)
KRAMNIK
Recently Vladimir Kramnik has joined
the ranks of those who wear the World Champions crown. In respect of this branch of
chess theory, Kramnik does fairly well with two games where he has managed to get a rook
to e4 in sixteen moves:
Kramnik,V (2740) - Dreev,A (2650) [D46]
Ciudad de Linares XIV Linares (9), 14.02.1997
1.Nf3 d5 2.d4 Nf6 3.c4 c6 4.Nc3 e6 5.e3 Nbd7 6.Qc2 Bd6 7.Bd3 0-0 8.0-0 Qe7 9.c5 Bc7 10.e4
dxe4 11.Nxe4 Nd5 12.Bd2 Rd8 13.Rae1 f6 14.Nd6 Nf8 15.Nxc8 Raxc8 16.Re4 (1-0 in 65 moves)
Kramnik,V (2770) - Ljubojevic,L (2565) [E17]
Investbanka Belgrade (4), 14.11.1997
1.Nf3 c5 2.c4 Nf6 3.Nc3 e6 4.g3 b6 5.Bg2 Bb7 6.0-0 Be7 7.Re1 d5 8.cxd5 exd5 9.d4 0-0
10.dxc5 bxc5 11.Nh4 Qd7 12.e4 Nxe4 13.Nxe4 dxe4 14.Qxd7 Nxd7 15.Bxe4 Bxe4 16.Rxe4
(½-½ in 42 moves)
To RECAP
Steinitz did it in a match v Lasker
in 12 moves (a record for a World Championship Match), Euwe and Fischer managed the same
in eleven moves in the Candidates cycle, Karpov's record was 12 v a computer and 15
against a human, as we have seen Kasparov has never managed to get a rook to the e4 square
before the 19th move.
THE RECORD
However now for the QUICKEST ever
occupation of the e4 square by a World Champion playing white, please take your hats off
for the one and only Emanuel Lasker, who did it in EIGHT MOVES and against not a bad
opponent:
Lasker,E - Tarrasch,S [C60] 12.--
G06 GER Berlin, 1916 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Nxe4 6.d4 Be7 7.Re1 b5
8.Rxe4 (Eight moves - what a player. I'll give the rest in full:) d5 9.Nxe5 Nxe5 10.Rxe5
bxa4 11.Nc3 Be6 12.Qh5 g6 13.Qf3 Bf6 14.Rxd5 Bxd5 15.Nxd5 Bg7 16.Bg5 Qxg5 17.Nxc7+ Kd7
18.Nxa8 1-0
And this deserves a diagram:
I rest my case.
Gilbert Palmer A chess fan
(This article was originally posted
to the rec.games.chess.misc newsgroup on 5th May 1999)
