After qualifying for the World Championship cycle in the 1987 interzonal tournament held in Subotica, Yugoslavia. He defeated Yasser Seirawan in his first round 4–1, and Nigel Short in the second round 3.5-1.5 and then in the semi-finals he lost to Jan Timman with a 3.5-4.5 score. In the 1990–93 championship cycle, he lost to Nigel Short in the firt round with a 4,5-5,5 score.
Speelman has a highly original style and has a wide opening and in the book his comments are quite instructive. All 38 games are fun to play over...here’s one of them. It’s am amazing tactical display by the 15-year old Speelman.
In the introduction to the game he modestly calls the game, “some hackery from a county match.” It’s interesting to note that auto-analysis with Stockfish assigns Speelman’s play a Weighted Erro Value of 0.14 which means almost every move he played was Stockfish 16.1’s top choice!
Speelman makes what I think is a serious mistake though...he wrote, “...although I blundered in the early middlegame, (the game) is memorable for the spectacular ,if somewhat obvious, sacrificial attack which I was able to whip up after he let me back into the game…”
The “blunder” to which he refers is 15...Ng6. While the move might be a “blunder” at Speelman’s level of play, it’s not really one at the level at which most of us play! Stockfish 16 evaluates the position at -0.10 (almost dead equal) before the move and at +0.44 (slightly in white’s favor) after. A swing of about half a Pawn would mean almost nothing to most of us.
Rory O'Kelly–Jonathan Speelman0–1E63Cambridge-Middlesex Team Matcj1971Stockfish 16
E63: King's Indian: Fianchetto: Panno Variation 1.d4 f6 2.c4 g6 3.g3 g7 4.g2 0-0 5.c3 d6 6.f3 c6 7.0-0 a6 8.h3 e5 9.d5 e7 10.c5 The
standard move here is 10.e4. The text is aggressive and best be described as
interesting. d7 10...b5 11.cxb6 cxb6 12.e4 b5 13.b4 d7 equals.
Marovic,D (2475)-Smejkal,J (2575) Vrsac 1977 10...e4 11.cxd6 xd6 12.g5 exd5 13.gxe4 xc3 14.xd6 xd1 15.xc8 axc8 16.xd1 c6 with equality.
Grabarczyk,B (2260)-Zimmerman,Y (2280) Polanica Zdroj POL 1992 11.cxd6 cxd6 12.e4 h6 13.e1 f5 14.exf5 gxf5 15.h2 g6 According to Speelman this is
a blunder that loses a Pawn and should have lead to a deci- sive disadvantage.
That assessment seems too harsh as white's advantage is minimal...about half a
P. 15...f6 is slightly better though. 16.a4 d7 and neither side can
claim an advantage. 16.h5 After this white does have the initiative, but
no distinct way of forcing an advantage. h7 17.f3 Speelman wrote that he
probably saw white's last move, but missed this one. While white has no way of
forcing a breakthrough on the K-side any misstep by black is likely to gave
serious consequences. e8 This gives white the edge. 17...e7 18.g5+ g8 19.e6 f6 20.xd8 xh5 21.e6 xe6 22.dxe6 e4 23.g4 f6 24.f4 White's
piece activity gives him slightly the better of it. 18.g5+ g8 19.e6 f6 20.xg7 Logical as it eliminated the B, but 20.Qxf5 was even
better. 20.xf5 is quite complex and OTB it would also br quite unclear! e7 21.c2 xe6 22.dxe6 d5 23.b3 c6 24.e3 with a active position. 20...xg7 21.xh6+ This, not the previous move as suggested by Speelman, is
the one that lets black off the hook. 21.xh6+ f7 22.f3 h8 23.g5 h7 24.d2 f6 25.ac1 White has completed his development and gotten both Rs
into play and so here he stands better. 21...f7 22.e3 h8
While theiretically the position might be equal, in practice black is more
active. 23.b6 This puts the Q out of play and so 23.Qe3 woulf have been
safer. f4 This clears the way for the B. 24.xd6 This is a serious
mistake. In his notes Speelman states that black is now able to launch a
vicious attack, but admitted that he played in on instinct and did not
remember exactly how he intended to followup the sacrifice. 24.h1 This
prevents the sacrifice on h3. xh3 24...e7 25.g1 f5 is black's correct
line and here he stands somewhat better. 25.xh3 d7 26.g2 f3+ 27.xf3 xh3 28.xh3 xh3 29.xb7+ is to white's advantage. 24.c7+ This is
also a reasonable try. d7 25.d2 e7 and with the sacrifice on h3 looming
white still has to play his R to h1 and here, topo, black has the more
promising position. 24...xh3 Black has a winning attack. 25.xh3 xh3+
This is the only followup that results in success. Anything else puts white
back on an equal footing. 26.xh3 This leads to forced mate, so he had to
try 26.Kg2. Speelman's original instinctive reaction was to dismiss this move
out of hand as "grim'; but white would still be lost. 26.g2 h8 27.g1 27.c7+ g8 28.g1 fxg3 29.fxg3 f8 is fatal for white. 30.xb7 30.f2 xd5+ 30...xg3+ 31.xg3 e4+ 32.xe4 h4+ 33.g2 xe4+ mates in 2 27...e8 28.f1 h1 29.xh1 xh1+ 30.e2 g2 31.d1 fxg3 32.g5 f3+ 33.c2 f5+ Black is winning. 26...h8+ 27.g2 Black could play 26...f3+
and still have a winning position, but there is a mate in 11 h4+ 28.g1 28.gxh4 g8+ 29.h3 Now black wins with a Q sacrifice. 29.f3 h5# 29...xh4+ 30.xh4 h8+ 31.g5 h5# 28...f3+ 29.g2 h2+ White
resigned. 29...h2+ 30.xf3 h5+ 31.g2 f3+ 32.g1 h8 White can only
delay mate by giving up material. 0–1
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