ANew York Times, New York, New York, Sunday, June 27, 1971 - Page 24
He Is One Man Who Will Not Quit by Al Horowitz
Perhaps the most important attribute exhibited by Bobby Fischer in his recent 6-0 match victory over Soviet grandmaster Mark Taimanov is his incredible will to win, a quality in which he is doubtless unequaled by any player alive. Twice in the match—in the second and fourth games—he played out, and won, endgames that virtually everybody else had abandoned as drawn.
After winning the first game, he secured a winning advantage in the second, only to see it go down the drain — it appeared — when play was resumed after the first adjournment. With this game still pending, he went on to achieve a winning position in the third game, also adjourned. The Soviets then made a perfectly understandable offer: Taimanov would resign the third game if Fischer would agree to a draw in the second. This would have made the score 2½-½ in Fischer's favor, and most other grandmasters would have accepted, but Fischer refused.
He elected to play the second game for a win from a position which Russian journalist Alexander Kotov (a member of Taimanov's entourage) described in an article in the newspaper “Sovietski Sport” as one which any chess player—let alone a Soviet grandmaster—could draw for Black. Small wonder that the news item reporting Taimanov's subsequent loss of this game was published anonymously in “Sovietski Sport!”
Of the endgame Fischer won in the fourth game, the reader can judge for himself. (The diagram shows the position shortly after play was resumed in the second session. White's advantage is minute, but there is the slight possibility that he can achieve a zugzwang position—as predicted by this writer at the time in a dispatch from Vancouver—and that is indeed what happened. Notice that at his 61st turn Black has no good move, and must permit the decisive sacrifice.
The fifth game is explicable only when it is set in the context of the match as a whole. Taimanov, as White, got much the better of it when Fischer played the incomprehensible move 9 … B-R3, only to go back to N2 two moves later. Perhaps it was Bobby's subtle way of showing Taimanov that he could get away with anything, but more likely it was one of those ideas that look much better in home analysis than they do over the board.
Taimanov pressed Fischer hard, but Bobby managed to stay alive through the first session and, when the game was adjourned, had only slightly the worst of it. The position at adjournment was of course subjected to feverish analysis by Taimanov, his second, and all the Russian contingent, and when played resumed Taimanov's head was so crammed with subtle variations that he promptly put his rook en prise and resigned.
The sixth game of the match was little more than a formality. Bobby was doubtless looking ahead to his forthcoming match with Larsen; Taimanov's private thoughts can hardly be imagined. Fischer won a pawn in the early middlegame, and pressed home his advantage with exemplary technique.
In an interview given to a Russian newspaper, world champion Boris Spassky is reported to have said that he now thinks Bobby Fischer will probably be his next challenger.
Robert James Fischer vs Mark Taimanov Fischer - Taimanov Candidates Quarterfinal (1971), Vancouver CAN, rd 4, May-25 Sicilian Defense: Paulsen. Bastrikov Variation (B47) 1-0 https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1044361 move 44. … Kxd6
Mark Taimanov vs Robert James Fischer Fischer - Taimanov Candidates Quarterfinal (1971), Vancouver CAN, rd 5, May-27 Gruenfeld Defense: General (D80) 0-1 https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1044721 move 28. … Be7
