APensacola News Journal Pensacola, Florida Saturday, April 16, 1960
Pushing The Pawns In Moscow
Chess players, that hardy, silent breed, will be following with keen interest the matches being played in Moscow these days by two masters of the game named Botvinnik and Tal. Botvinnik is world champion; Tal, who at twenty-three is less than half his age, is the challenger. And Tal won the first match in thirty-two moves, which is approximately the equivalent of Kansas City beating the Yankees 10-2 on opening day.
Since brevity is not the soul of chess, and since no fewer than twenty-four matches are being played, it may be some time before we know whether the brains of Botvinnik or the talents of Tal prevail.
Nowadays the chess championship seems to be a Russian monopoly (Tal, to be exact, is a Latvian), but this was not formerly the case, for many countries in both hemispheres have had their great players. In fact, in sixteen-year-old Bobby Fischer, a student at Erasmus Hall High School in Brooklyn, the United States right now has a prospective champion.
In any case, it may be reassuring to learn that to many Russians the virtues of the Ruy Lopez and Philidor's Defense are still as absorbing as the latest advances in rocketry. Your move Botvinnik; steady, Tal — and let us know how it comes out.
—New York Herald Tribune
