"I actually played a bad tournament!" - Grandmaster on 'Game of the Year'
Two months into 2023, Romanian Grandmaster Gergely-Andras-Gyula Szabo played what has been touted as a candidate for Game of the Year. The experienced chess coach talks about the game and the mixed reactions from fans and friends.
Romanian Grandmaster Gergely-Andras-Gyula Szabo is not a household name in the chess world, but his victory over FM Nicodum-Cosmin Stepanescu in Round 6 of the Romanian Championship last week, has catapulted him into the limelight.
It was a remarkable display of chess brilliancy that is bound to be a candidate for "Game of the Year".
"It was a great feeling to play such an exciting game, and I was kind of energized after it," 39-year-old Szabo tells chess24 between chess lessons.
If you haven't already scrolled through the game, here's another chance:
Romanian Championship · Round 6
2023.02.23 · chess24.com
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1.e4c62.d4d53.e5Bf54.h4h55.Bd3Bxd36.Qxd3Qa5+7.Nd2e68.Nf3Nh69.O-ONf510.c4Be711.g3O-O12.b3Rd813.Rd1c514.dxc5Qxc515.Nf1dxc416.Qxd8+Bxd817.Rxd8+Kh718.Ne3Qa519.Ng5+Kg620.Ng2Nxg321.Nf4+Kf522.Nxf7Qc323.Kg2Ne424.Rf8Kg425.Be3Nxf226.Nd5Qxa127.Nh6+Kxh428.Bxf2+Kg529.Be3+Kg630.Ne7+Kh731.Nf7Nc632.Ng5+Kh633.Nf7+Kh734.Ng5+Kh635.Nxe6+Kh736.Ng5+Kh637.Nf5+Kg638.Nh4+Kh639.Nf7+Kh740.Ng5+Kh641.Rxa8g642.Rg8Nxe543.Rxg6+1-0
The grandmaster has a rating of 2504 and is ranked 10th in Romania. He is the current coach for the Romanian Women's team, and calls himself "semi-retired".
I am very happy to have played such a game, especially as my mission as a player and as a coach is to make chess more popular.
About the game, Szabo tells chess24 that he felt forced to give up his queen as he was already worse out of the opening.
If my opponent had played 14...Nc6, that's quite some trouble for White. As you could see, I thought for almost 15 minutes before playing 14.dxc5. I knew it wasn't optimal, but I wanted to lure my opponent into taking the queen.
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After his 27.Nh6!+, White had a forced checkmate in 16 moves. Asked how much of it he had actually seen, Szabo says:
I saw reasonably far, until 31.Nf7 (seeing that I have at a minimum a perpetual afterwards, and correctly assessing the following attack as winning). I repeated the position a few times to get to move 40. However, I missed the mate-in-8 starting with 25.Nh6+.
25.Nh6+! is even mate-in-7!
Szabo points out that he just tried to make as many checks as possible before the time control, and that he did not see what was coming from move 31.
Gergely Szabo on a Romanian TV show | photo: Strategie in Alb si Negru
The funny thing is, everyone who analysed the game thought I missed 26.Nd3!! which is half-true; I had seen 25.Nh6+ gxh6 26.Nd3!!, but got blocked after 26...Kxh4 (and didn't see that 27.Bxh6 renewed the threats). Also, the fact that I saw 25.Be3 Nxf2 26.Nd5! made my decision easier. Not as nice, but I made up for that with the final 43.Rxg6+!
The game has already gained considerable attention in the chess world. Renowned Israeli-American grandmaster and chess author Boris Avrukh tweeted, "please drop what you are doing and check this amazing game".
From there it took off, with top chess streamer Levy 'GothamChess' Rozman calling it a "banger of a game" in a video that has more than a million views.
Dutch Grandmaster Benjamin Bok also covered it in a video he titled "Game of the Year 2023?!" Agadmator's "Everyone Needs To See This" has 150,000 views.
"Pretty entertaining all three of them", Szabo says.
As I noticed, Gotham Chess was very enthusiastic (maybe too much at times, for my taste), GM Bok was very calm and objective, and Agadmator was somewhere between them as an approach.
He says he has noted mixed reactions to the game from fans and friends. Some reactions have been what he describes as "overly emotional" to "fair and lucid". He also received what he calls "veiled accusations of cheating", which led to him responding to those commentating on Chess.com's article.
The third group of reactions came from those trying to belittle my achievement (oh, there was nothing brilliant about it, my grandma could do it/oh, the game is so suspicious, he must have cheated).
Szabo responded to comments under Chess.com's article
Szabo says there were anti-cheating measures in place during the tournament, and he was scanned in Round 4.
It's somewhat funny that I actually played a bad tournament — lost about 10 rating points, blundered a piece in one go in Round 1. I played on par, except Round 1. Had I won Round 1, that would have been no rating gain or loss.
The Romanian Championship was won by former Ukrainian star Kirill Shevchenko, who became the new national champion on a clear 8/9. Szabo finished in 10th place with 6 points.
Kirill Shevchenko, who won the Romanian Championship, during Round 1 against Radu Tampea | photo: Romanian Chess Federation
You can play through all the games from the tournament on our Broadcast page.
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