Lessons
The Top 10 Games Of The 1980s

The Top 10 Games Of The 1980s

SamCopeland
NM Sam Copeland
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NM Sam Copeland has picked the 10 best games of recent decades. Take a look at his picks for the 1980s and learn from the greatest games of an amazing time in the history of chess.

  • What astounding game did Kasparov play in a world title match?
  • Learn from some of the greatest sacrificial games of all time!

Karpov - Kasparov: Games Of The 80s

This game really begins with Kasparov playing his famous ...d5?! gambit. Today we know this pawn sacrifice to be unsound, but at the board, it was quite challenging to meet. In fact, Karpov's second, Geller, KNEW the refutation but failed to make sure Karpov knew it too! After Karpov misses his opportunity with 12.Be3!, Kasparov builds a great initiative.
18 min
5 Challenges

Kopylov vs. Korelov: Games Of The 80s

Check out a little-known correspondence chess king hunt!
13 min
5 Challenges

Polugaevsky vs. Torre: Games Of The 80s

Lev Polugaevsky shows off one of the most brilliant chess opening ideas ever played, his positional rook sacrifice against Eugenio Torre in the famed Botvinnik Variation of the Semi-Slav!
12 min
5 Challenges

Portisch vs. Pinter: Games Of The 80s

In one of the prettiest chess games of all time, Jozsef Pinter conducted a spectacular king hunt in the endgame, using his own king to help checkmate Lajos Portisch!
12 min
5 Challenges

Tal vs. Hjartarson: Games Of The 80s

Tal combines exquisite positional play with a beautiful final tactical denouement, winning a game that I consider one of the most precise of his excellent career. I challenge you to find any notable mistake by Tal in this game!
13 min
5 Challenges

Van de Loo vs. Hesseling: Games Of The 80s

According to GM Andy Soltis, the following game features the most stunning chess novelty ever played—19.Qa4!! On the other hand, some have alleged that this game never even happened and was a fabrication by the white player. The truth of this game is hard to pin down, an obscure but brilliant game from a weekender or the solitary creation of an opening enthusiast?
21 min
5 Challenges

Korchnoi vs. Karpov: Games Of The 1980s

Anatoly Karpov is absolutely central to the story of chess in the 1980s. Karpov dominated the early half of the decade and played five (!) world chess championship matches in the 1980s. This might have been his best game of the decade!
15 min
5 Challenges

Smirin vs. Beliavsky: Games Of The 80s

Many great chess players have lived in Garry Kasparov's chess shadow. Alexander Beliavsky is one of those players - a brilliant attacker who you may not even have heard of, but who was one of the strongest players in the 1980s aside from Kasparov and Karpov.
13 min
5 Challenges

Kasparov vs. Petrosian: Games Of The 80s

In Tilburg in 1981, the 18-year-old prodigy Garry Kasparov faced the great world chess champion Tigran Petrosian. Kasparov was already amazingly strong, but Petrosian still knew a few tricks.
16 min
5 Challenges

Beliavsky vs. Nunn: Games Of The 80s

In this game, we see John Nunn punishing Alexander Beliavsky's Samisch variation as the move 9.h3? provides him the opportunity to initiate an inexorable assault.
13 min
5 Challenges

The Top 10 Games Of The 1980s

Master Games
10 Lessons
146 Minutes
50 Challenges
Released January 4, 2022

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