Televised chess in the early days: the Deutschland Cup 1989

The Deutschland Cup 1989

After the successful staging of the Cologne Cup in 1988, a match between Vlastimil Hort and the young world chess champion Garry Kasparov (2½-½ for Kasparov), the main sponsor and organiser at the time, SPAR-Himmelreich-Handelsgesellschaf, went one step further the following year and organised an even bigger event in Cologne, a rapid chess knockout tournament under the name 'Deutschland Cup'.

The renowned Sartory-Säle in Cologne near Friesenplatz in the city centre was chosen as the venue for this chess tournament. The venue consists of seven halls with a total capacity of 3500 spectators. The largest hall can accommodate 1400 people. Over the years, a number of well-known rock bands have performed in the Sartory halls, including Queen (1974), Status Quo (1975), Scorpions (1979) and AC/DC (1978). Cologne music lovers also particularly enjoyed going to concerts by Bläck Föss or BAP. Sports events were also organised in the Sartory halls, e.g. a boxing match with Vitaly Klitschko (1997 and 1998). The most popular events, however, were and still are the annual carnival sessions in February.

Master Class Vol.17 - Boris Spassky

In this video course, experts including Dorian Rogozenco, Mihail Marin, Karsten Müller and Oliver Reeh, examine the games of Boris Spassky. Let them show you which openings Spassky chose to play, where his strength in middlegames were and much more.

In view of these top acts, the choice of large halls seemed moderately optimistic, but proved to be entirely appropriate in terms of the actual audience interest.

The tournament was organised by the SPAR Group together with the German Chess Federation. Helmut Nöttger and Horst Metzing were responsible for organising the tournament.

The selection of the field of participants proved to be particularly successful - if you are a fan of unforeseen surprises. Top international stars joined top German representatives, but also with up-and-coming players.

The participants included the top Cologne grandmasters Robert Hübner and Vlastimil Hort, the Frankfurt grandmaster Eric Lobron, international stars such as the two former world champions Mikhail Tal and Boris Spassky, the two-time vice world champion Viktor Korchnoi, John Nunn and Larry Christansen. There were also strong young German players such as Christopher Lutz, Oliver Reeh, Matthias Wahls and Ralf Appel and several others.

However, it was the participation of the three Polgar sisters, who had already made a name for themselves not only in chess circles, that attracted the most attention. The youngest, Judit Polgar, had already started beating up a number of established grandmasters on the board at tournaments and, with 2555 Elo, was already at the level of Boris Spassky, for example. Compared to today's rating figures, you have to add around 120 rating points to assess her performance. In the world rankings, the 12-year-old Judit Polgar was already in the top 100 (she was ranked 66^th in July 1989). It was mainly thanks to the three Polgar sisters that around 1000 spectators followed the action live on site on each of the five match days.

There were 8 GMs in the field of participants, all of whom were seeded for the round of 16. The remaining 16 players, including the Polgar sisters, had to play a preliminary round.

Here the results were different to what the organisers might have wished for. The young IM Oliver Reeh from Hamburg, 25 years old at the time, caused the biggest upset. He played against the chess prodigy Judit Polgar and was already winning in the classical 1-hour game.

And in the 15-minute game that followed, Judit Polgar's attack again came to nothing, and this time the German IM didn't waste his unexpected opportunity.

Ralf Appel from Pirmasens, 18 years old at the time, followed suit and knocked Sofia Polgar out of the tournament.

On the second day, the young Germans continued upsetting the seeded grandmasters. Oliver Reeh went on to beat chess legend Mikhail Tal.

The magician from Riga, who is known to be extremely friendly, acknowledged his somewhat bitter defeat against Oliver Reeh with the words: "Give my regards to your father!"

Mikhail Tal had been a guest at the anniversary event of the Bremen SG three years earlier and had given a simultaneous exhibition. Oliver Reeh's father, Axel Reeh, had organised the event. The following blitz evenings with Mikhail Tal were legendary. The former world champion always blitzed simultaneously against two opponents and won all the games. He also smoked and drank whisky during the games.

Master Class Vol.2: Mihail Tal

On this DVD Dorian Rogozenco, Mihail Marin, Oliver Reeh and Karsten Müller present the 8. World Chess Champion in video lessons: his openings, his understanding of chess strategy, his artful endgame play, and finally his immortal combinations.

Mikhail Tal

Ralf Appel was also not to be outdone in this round as he defeated Boris Spassky.

Christopher Lutz, who had won the match against Matthias Wahls in the preliminary round, knocked out the World Championship Candidate Vlastimil Hort.

Susan Polgar survived in her first match, against Wolfram Schön, by winning the tiebreak game. On the second day, however, the eldest of the Polgar sisters lost to Eric Lobron.

On the third day of the tournament, in the quarterfinals, two of the favourites, Christopher Lutz and Oliver Reeh, faced each other. Christopher Lutz emerged victorious. The third underdog, Ralf Appel, was able to remain in the contest after defeating Eric Lobron.

At least two of the top grandmasters, Robert Hübner and Viktor Korchnoi, managed to escape their colleagues' fate. In the semifinals, they faced the two young guns, Ralf Appel and Christopher Lutz, and put an end to the youngsters' disrespectful behaviour.

Robert Hübner had a pretty bad position to manage against Ralf Appel after the opening. However, after inaccurate play by his opponent, the former World Championship Candidate was able to show his class.

This resulted in a final match between two strong GMs, one that saw Robert Hübner emerging victorious in the end. He won the fifth playoff game against Korchnoi after the first four games had ended drawn.

Robert Hübner

Ralf Appel won the match for third place.

Videos (in German)

Master Class Vol.16 - Judit Polgar

In this video course, experts (Pelletier, Marin, Müller and Reeh) examine the games of Judit Polgar. Let them show you which openings Polgar chose to play, where her strength in middlegames were, or how she outplayed her opponents in the endgame.

Day 1: Preliminary round

Day 2: Round of 16

Day 3: Quarterfinals

Day 4: Semifinals

Day 5: Final

Links

• Sartory Säle Cologne
• Karpov on Fischer, Korchnoi, Kasparov and the chess world today
• Checkmate: A Memorable Love Story (Sally and Misha): Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7