Rashid Gibiatovich Nezhmetdinov, a name to remember

Dennis Monokroussos writes: A fearless and immensely talented tactician (witness his +3-1 record against Tal!), Rashid Nezhmetdinov's relatively one-sided style prevented him from achieving the highest competitive successes, but it also allowed him to produce a large number of sacrificial masterpieces.

This week's game is no exception. Playing White against Chernikov's Accelerated Dragon, Nezhmetdinov headed for a line generally played as an invitation to a quick draw. To his opponent’s shock, he eschewed the lazy route and chose to sacrifice his queen for just two pieces and a bit of central control. Was the sacrifice sound? Could Chernikov have defended successfully? Tune in for the answers; in the game itself, however, he didn’t, succumbing to an array of subsequent sacrifices – Nezhmetdinov went on to offer the exchange (several times), a knight and a rook!

To see this spectacular game and to get some grip on what was actually going on, tune in this Monday night at 9 p.m. EST – you’ll be glad you did.

Dennis Monokroussos is 38, lives in South Bend, IN (the site of the University of Notre Dame), and is writing a Ph.D. dissertation in philosophy (in the philosophy of mind) while adjuncting at the University.

He is fairly inactive as a player right now, spending most of his non-philosophy time being a husband and teaching chess. At one time he was one of the strongest juniors in the U.S., but quit for about eight years starting in his early 20s. His highest rating was 2434 USCF, but he has now fallen to the low-mid 2300s – "too much blitz, too little tournament chess", he says.

Dennis has been working as a chess teacher for seven years now, giving lessons to adults and kids both in person and on the internet, worked for a number of years for New York’s Chess In The Schools program, where he was one of the coaches of the 1997-8 US K-8 championship team from the Bronx, and was very active in working with many of CITS’s most talented juniors.

When Dennis Monokroussos presents a game, there are usually two main areas of focus: the opening-to-middlegame transition and the key moments of the middlegame (or endgame, when applicable). With respect to the latter, he attempts to present some serious analysis culled from his best sources (both text and database), which he has checked with his own efforts and then double-checked with his chess software.

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