Although he was blanked 6-0 by Fischer in their 1971 Candidates match, Fischer's retirement moved him back to the top of Western GM's.
Famously Larsen almost always avoided team matches (ie Olympiads) as he felt that playing under team "orders" was antithetical to the individual nature of chess. He was also willing to take risks in his games believing that he earned 2 wins for every loss that occurred.
Here is a famous win over then world champion Tigran Petrosian from the 1966 Santa Monica tournament. The famed master of defence is brought undone in 30 moves, and Larsen even gets to throw in a Queen sacrifice.
Larsen,Bent - Petrosian,Tigran V [B39]
Piatigorsky-Cup 2nd Santa Monica (7), 27.07.1966
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 g6 5.Be3 Bg7 6.c4 Nf6 7.Nc3 Ng4 8.Qxg4 Nxd4 9.Qd1 Ne6 10.Qd2 d6 11.Be2 Bd7 12.0-0 0-0 13.Rad1 Bc6 14.Nd5 Re8 15.f4 Nc7 16.f5 Na6 17.Bg4 Nc5 18.fxg6 hxg6 19.Qf2 Rf8 20.e5 Bxe5 21.Qh4 Bxd5 22.Rxd5 Ne6 23.Rf3 Bf6 24.Qh6 Bg7 (D)
25.Qxg6 Nf4 26.Rxf4 fxg6 27.Be6+ Rf7 28.Rxf7 Kh8 29.Rg5 b5 30.Rg3 1-0
1 comment:
"Famously Larsen almost always avoided team matches (ie Olympiads) as he felt that playing under team "orders" was antithetical to the individual nature of chess."
That´s not completely correct. First of all he had big problems with some of the the chairmen in the Danish Chessfederation. [Like Torben Ulrich (tennis) and Poul Elvstrøm (sailing) had it in the same years]. Later on he refused because of some principal ratingproblems. And also he wouldn´t play due to some oeconomical reasons. The last two reasons in maybe in reversed order...
Actually he played on the first board in a european teammatch against Czechoslovakia in around 1981.
Btw. he was called up from a danish chessclub at his birthday. He was in good form and he told us that he was studing Dus-Chotimirsky games(!)
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