Cunctator
Raymond Keene
following his splendid opening spurt of 31/4 in the category 15 World Cup tournament, currently in progress in Montreal, Portisch is now pursuing the Fabian strategy of 'consolidating his lead with a series of draws. After eight rounds (almost the half-way stage) Portisch is still just at the top with Tal — Larsen, Montreal 1979: Sicilian Defence,
1 P-K4 P-QB4 2 N-KB3 N-QB3 3 P-Q4 PxP 4 NxP N-B3 5 N-QB3 P-Q3 6 B-KN5 P-K3 7 Q-Q2 B-K2 8 0-0-0 P-QR3 9 P-B4 Q-B2? Those of my friends who play the Sicilian claim that, in this particular position, the Q move is not advisable. At this stage of the tournament, however, Larsen had only A point from 4 games, which possibly explains the risks he takes now and on move 11. 10 B-K2 NxN 11 QxN P-QN4?! 12 P-K5! PxP 13 PxP N-Q4 14 BxB NxN 15 B-B3 NxR Capturing the R exposes Black to a typically fierce Tal onslaught. In the post-mortem Larsen suggested, as an improvement, 15 . . N-K7ch 16 BxN QxB 17 B-B3 B-N2 18 BxB QxB 19 0-06 R-QB1 20 R-Q2 Q-B3 21 KR-Q1 QxQ 22 RxQ R-R1 23 R-N6 P-KR4 24 R/1-Q6 P-R5 25 RxRP RxR 26 RxR R-R4, but after 27 R-R5 RxP 28 P-R4! White still enjoys a clear advantage. At least the game would have lasted longer that way. 16 B-Q6 Q-B5 17 Q-N6 N-B7 18 B-B6ch B-Q2 19 BxBch KxB 20 Q-N7ch K-Q1 21 QxRch Q-BI 22 A-R7 Black resigns. Amazingly, times consumed at the end of the game were: Tal, forty-seven minutes and Larsen, one hour and one minute.
By the time this article appears I will have been in Amsterdam for one week, completing the work for the FIDE Rules Commission. It seems, however, that at Montreal there have been absolutely no abrasive or upsetting incidents, which is, of course, as it ' should be. The organisers are probably highly relieved that Victor the orang-utan (introduced in David Levy's article of 7 April) was not invited there to throw banana skins at the players or drop coconuts on their heads.
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