The teams were divided into six groups of 7, and one group of 8. Only two top teams of each group were qualified into the main final. There were four final sections, three comprised of 14 teams and the bottom one with just 8 teams.
The Soviet Union was the only team to have six GMs and the American team was weakened because Bobby Fischer, William Lombardy and Larry Evans were missing.
In the first round of the Olympiad Dr. Anthony Saidy defeated Poland’s Jacek Bednarski (1939 – 2008), an International Master and a politician who won the Polish Championship in 1963.
Anthony Saidy (born in1937) is an International Master, a retired physician and author. He competed eight times in the U.S. Championship. He authored several chess books and a book of "what if" political fiction.
The game was published several times in Europe and it was presumed to be a brilliamcy. However, Saidy said of it, “To the average player, or even master, the piece sacrifice looks convincing, for did not the opponent collapse within eight moves?" He then made the observation that there is a pitfall in all tactical games...the first evaluation barely glimpses the ramifications and “...in the
heat of the arena (the players) have no full grasp of the complexities.”
When the mighty Paul Keres annotated the game in the British Chess Magazine he lauded Saidy’s play and complimented him for a “nicely played game” which, coming from the likes of Paul Keres, was a huge compliment. But, in his analysis Saidy concluded that the game was “flawed.” Was it? Let’s see what Stockfish’s opinion is.
Anthony Saidy (USA)–Jacek Bednarski (Poland)1–0E80Olympiad, Tel Aviv, Qual D03.11.1964Stockfish 15.1
K-Indian: Saemisch 1.c4 g6 2.c3 g7 3.d4 f6 4.e4 d6 The Saemisch
always gave Bobby Fischer trouble so that he eventually avoided the K-Indian
if he believed he would face it. However, when he faced the Saemisch against
Spassky in their 1992 rematch, Fischer scored +2 -1 =2 5.f3 c6 A rare
sideline that has never brought black much success. He usually castles here. 6.e3 a6 7.d2 b5 8.d3 bd7 9.ge2 0-0 10.0-0 bxc4 11.xc4 b6 12.b3 a5 13.a4 a6 14.fc1 fd7 This is black's best move. He has
complete equality. 14...b5 15.xb6 xb6 16.c3 a4 17.d1 fc8 17...fb8 18.b4 a3 19.ab1 d7 20.xb5 xb5 Lehikoinen,P (2229)-Seeman,T (2441)
Helsinki 2002. White is better. 17...d7 18.xb5 xb5 19.e2 b7 20.ab1 fc8 21.c4 d5 Mishra,N (2363)-Suvrajit,S (2335) Nagpur 1999 is fully equal. 18.ab1 a6 19.xb5 xb5 20.b4 axb3 21.xb3 a6 The chances are about
even. Adler,J (2274)-Ballmann,M (2375) Switzerland 2014 15.c2 Black has
achieved complete equality. His c-Pawn is backward, but white would gain
nothing by capturing it. 15.xc6 b5 16.xb6 xb6 17.cc1 a4 with full
compensation for the P. 15...c5 Writing in the British Chess Magazine the
legendary Paul Keres questioned this move, but Saidy disagreed commenting that
the move was "impeccable." Stockfish agrees with Saidy. 16.xc5
As Saidy put it, "... appalled by the disjointed position of my own pieces and
the fact that black had so swiftly freed his position" he spent 50 minutes to
come up with this move. In his notes Keres awarded this sacrifice a "!"
stating, "The combination is original and easily overlooked.". Saidy's reply
was, "Perhaps it should have been!" Once again, Saidy is correct...Stockfish
says so! It even gives black a decisive advantage. 16.xb6 xb6 and white
has the option of keeping thing equal after either 17.Nc3 or 17.dxc5 16...dxc5 17.dxc5 a4 Another fine move. It's better than Keres' suggestion of 17..
.Nc8 17...c8 18.d1 xe2 19.xe2 c7 20.a4 e5 21.c6 a7 22.f4 exc6 23.e5 g5 24.g3 and white has ample compensation for the N. 18.xf7+
This weakening Black's King position is the only PRACTICAL chance white has.
By the way, Saidy now had less than a half hour left for 23 moves! 18.cxb6 axb3 19.axb3 is Stockfish's coldblooded suggestion, but it leaves white with
zero practical chances. 18...xf7 19.cxb6 xe2 Here Keres
wrote, "Certainly black's best practical chance", but, again, Saidy correctly
disagreed. The fact is this move costs Bednarski the game. 19...e5
is correct and after 20.xd8+ xd8 21.ac1 d3 22.d2 ff8 23.b1 e5 24.xd8 xd8 Black's advantage is decisive. 20.xe2 Remember Saisy was in
terrible time pressure and so he played this automatically so as not to waste
precious time on the obvious, but after the text black has a slight edge. 20.b7 is decisive. b8 21.ac1 xb2 22.c8 xc1 23.xc1 etc. 20...xb6 20...a3 This is plable, but it doesn't lead anywhere after 21.d1 axb2 22.a4 xa4 23.xb2 xb2 24.xb2 e5 25.b7 a5 26.b8+ xb8 27.xb8+ g7
and black won't be able to make any progress 21.d1 b8 The decisive error
and the one that was responsible for the acclaimed brilliancy. 21...d7
This is another story. 22.cd2 e6 23.b5 b8 24.xb8+ xb8 25.d8+ f8 26.xf8+ xf8 27.d8+ f7 In Shootouts from thids position 5 games were drawn 22.b5 c8 This represents complete collapse. 22...f6
was tougher, but in the long run there is no doubt about the outcome. 23.c6 xc6 24.xc6 c8 25.xb6 b8 26.a7 f6 27.c1 b7 28.xa4 xb2 White
has a decisive advantage. 23.d8+ f8 24.d5+ Black resigned. Maybe the
game was not a brilliancy, but it was exciting plus it was not often that
anybody could out-analyzed Paul Keres as Saidy did in this game! 24.d5+ h8 25.xf8+ xf8 26.d4+ e5 26...g7 27.d8# 27.xe5+ 1–0
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