Larsen v Spassky, Belgrade 1970: 17 moves on board one

In 1970 the USSR played a team of the best players from the rest of the world in Belgrade. Bent Larsen played board one for the Rest of the World, ahead of Bobby Fischer, then the highest-rated player, and in round 2, on 31 March 1970, he faced the world champion, Boris Spassky. Larsen chose an unusual opening, 1.b3, to take Spassky out of the book. Spassky won in 17 moves, a very rare result at this level, and took the brilliancy prize for the round. The USSR won the match 20½–19½.

Black to move after 14.Rg1. Spassky's next move gives up a rook.

The whole game

Larsen v Spassky, USSR v Rest of the World, Belgrade 1970. Step through all 17 moves; White resigned.

What Stockfish makes of it

We had Stockfish check every move.

10.f4: the mistake

White to move after 9...O-O-O. 10.a3 keeps White's disadvantage small; 10.f4 lets Black in.

Black was already a little better out of the opening, but 10.f4 made it much worse: Stockfish prefers 10.a3, under a pawn worse for White, against nearly three pawns after 10.f4.

12...h4: the knight offer

12...h4! 13.hxg4 hxg3: Black lets the knight go and opens the h-file.

After 12.h3 Black's knight on g4 is attacked, and Spassky left it there with 12...h4. Larsen thought for 45 minutes before taking it. 12...h4 and 13...hxg3 were each the only move that kept Black's big advantage: Stockfish rates Black more than five pawns better.

14...Rh1: the rook sacrifice

14...Rh1 15.Rxh1 g2 16.Rf1 Qh4+ 17.Kd1 gxf1=Q+: White resigned.

Spassky gave up a rook to push his g-pawn through. Stockfish finds 14...Bxe3 and 14...Qh4 slightly stronger, but 14...Rh1 wins too, and 15...g2 was then the only winning move. 16.Rf1 allowed a forced mate; 16.Rg1 would have lasted longer. After 17...gxf1=Q+ Larsen resigned.

How we checked

The moves are from ChessBase and ramachess.com, which agree. We replayed every move with python-chess: all are legal. One old account says the game lasted 18 moves; the score has 17.
The engine: Stockfish 16.1 checked every move at depth 22, and the key moments again at depth 26. "A pawn better" is Stockfish's measure of the position, not a count of material.
The history: from ChessBase, a FIDE retrospective, Stabroek News and Wikipedia's page on the Nimzowitsch–Larsen Attack.

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