The Traxler's Check Returns with Mikhail Tal

Recently I received another chess game from chessfriend Yury V. Bukayev. He was glad to make me glad too.

I have found else one ex-WCC Jerome-ish game! It is by M.Tal

That sounded interesting - and it was. Past World Chess Champion Mikhail Tal played the Traxler Defense, and the game quickly dove into complications. It reminds me of Tal's comment

You must take your opponent into a deep dark forest where 2 + 2 = 5, and the path leading out is only wide enough for one.

However, some sources for the game did not agree with other sources about some of the facts of the game.

For example, Dr. Tim Harding referred to the game as a "Telephone corr, USSR 1968-69" in his January 2001 ChessMail magazine (page 48) but later asks

Can anyone clarify the circumstances of this game? I think it was a CC consultation game in the USSR. Heisman [The Traxler Counterattack, (2000) ] just calls it Readers v Tal. We have also seen White given as “White Rook Youth Club” and as “Chitatelj” (a transliteration of the Russian word for Readers)

Yury has put his detective skills to work

I have found else some important accounts about the dates of this game: 

1.The Soviet top GM Paul P. Keres has written on page 86 of his theoretical opening manual Dreispringerspiel bis Koenigsgambit (Berlin, 1971) that this game was played in 1969. 

2.Maarten de Zeeuw has written on page 147 of Yearbook, #63, where his article "Another Look at the Traxler Gambit" is published, that "the famous game between readers of Pionerskaya Pravda and Tal ...1968/69". 

3.The article "Traxler-Gegenangriff" (de.wikipedia.org) has written that this game was played in 1969. 

Further, about nature of this game. Wikipedia explains that a telephone was a channel between M.Tal and the editorial of "Pionerskaya Pravda". This editorial (which has had a strong chess editor) has gathered suggestions of every new move from Soviet pioneers (by postcards, most probably), and has chosen the best suggestion from them to make White's new move. Pioneers-players have got current news about this game from a new issue of the newspaper, most probably. So M.Tal and the editorial have had a time for their "home analysis" too. That is why, it is a correspondence game The Consultants - Tal , I have understood. 

I'm sure, it was finished in 1969. Was it started in 1969 or in 1968? The Lenin Komsomol has celebrated 50 years in the October, 29, 1968. The newspaper "Pionerskaya Pravda" was edited by it, so, it maybe, this game was started in the October or in the November of 1968. It is my version now. 

 

The Consultants - Mikhail Tal

correspondence, 1969 

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 Bc5 

The Traxler countergambit in the Two Knights defense. It is very complicated.

5.Nxf7 Bxf2+ 

With a Jerome-ish twist.

6.Kxf2 Nxe4+ 7.Kg1 Qh4 

8.g3 Nxg3 9.hxg3 Qxg3+ 10.Kf1 Rf8 

11.Qh5 d5 12.Bxd5 Nd4 13.Qh2 Qg4 14.Qxe5+ 

14...Be6 15.Bxe6 Qf3+ 16.Kg1 Ne2+ 17.Kh2 Qf2+ 18.Kh3 Qf3+ 19.Kh4 Qf2+ 20.Kh5 Rxf7 

It was only here that Stockfish 14.1 pointed out that this was its last book move!

21.Bxf7+ Kxf7 22.Rh2 

A slip, according to the computer, as 22.Qd5+ Kf8 23.d3 c6 24.Qd6+ Kg8 25.Rh2 Ng3+ 26.Kg4 Qxh2 27.Bh6 Rf8 28.Nd2 gxh6 29.Qe6+ Kg7 30.Qe7+ Rf7 31.Qe5+ Kg8 32.Qe8+ Rf8 would lead to a draw. Okay, if you say so.

Now the Consultants get into deep trouble.

22...Qf3+ 23.Kh4 g5+ 24.Qxg5 Rg8 25.Qh5+ Qxh5+ 26.Kxh5 

Sure, Tal is now down a Rook and a Bishop, but his pieces are all developed, and Black's are mostly not. The game is almost over.

26...Ng3+ 

Some observers were surprised that the Magician from Riga missed the checkmate 26...Nf4+ 27.Kh6 Rg6+ 28.Kxh7 Rg7+ 29.Kh6 Kg8 30.Rg2 Rxg2 31.Nc3 Rg6#  

27.Kh6 

The proper defnse was 27.Kh4 when Black has only the draw 27...Nf5+ 28. Kh5 Ng3+ etc.

 27...Nf5+ 

Again, Tal "misses" the checkmate that would come after 27...Rg6+ 28.Kxh7 Ne4 29.Rf2+ Nxf2 30.d4 Ng4 31.Kh8 Nf6 32.Nc3 Rg8# 

28.Kxh7 Rg7+ Draw

I suspect that Tal was enjoying the game, and rather than overlooking the possible checkmates, he decided to settle for a draw and give his young opponents the opportunity of a lifetime - to say that they drew a game against an ex-world champion.