AThe Times Shreveport, Louisiana Monday, July 17, 1972 - Page 1
Commanding Position Held by Fischer by Ian Westergren
Reykjavik, Iceland (UPI) — The third game of the world chess championship match was adjourned after 40 moves Sunday and experts said U.S. challenger Bobby Fischer appeared to be headed for his first win against world champion Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union.
Spassky was in trouble as he pondered his 41st move. After he made it, he got up and left the table. Fischer remained in his black leather swivel chair for 10 minutes pondering his response and then filed it in an envelop to be opened when play resumes at 5 p.m. (1 p.m. EDT) Monday.
Fischer ended the five-hour playing session Sunday on the attack. He forced two queen checks in the 38th and 39th moves.
“Bobby has a chance to win this game,” said Robert Byrne, a U.S. grand master. “He is a pawn ahead. The only problem is that they have bishops of different (board) colors which is a complication.”
Even Nikolai Krogius, one of the world champion's seconds, admitted the American chess grand master had a good chance for his first win in the $250,000 match. Fischer lost the first game by a decision on the 56th move and the second game by forfeit when he failed to show up. Spassky, 35, leads in the 24-game match 2-0.
In Closed Room
Sunday's game was begun in a closed room with only the arbiter's present. The room, a table tennis playing area, is 75 feet by 30 feet with red-painted walls and yellow curtains to shut out the late night sun.
For a time organizers feared Fischer, 29, would again fail to show up protesting the presence of closed-circuit television cameras in the Icelandic Chess Hall. ([Why should Fischer do that? Were the “closed-circuit television cameras” buzzing with crews of disruptive camera men, making noise and visually, making such a commotion they blew Fischer's concentration, or is this another of the sordid attempts to mislead the unsuspecting world public into the wrong assumption those cameras in the playing hall, were “automated, un-manned cameras…” just as Fischer was wrongly led to believe, by Chester Fox, Inc., and the organizers in Moscow-controlled, Icelandic Chess Federation?])
However, 90 minutes before the game was to begin the unpredictable chess genius suddenly changed his mind and agreed to play in the closed room.
When the game was adjourned after Spassky, playing white took his 41st move and Fischer had handed his next move to arbiter Lothar Schmid of West Germany, Fischer hurried from the closed room with his second, the Rev. William Lombardy, the American's only analyst.
Others agreeing that Fischer held a commanding position in the third game were Frank Skoff, president-elect of the U.S. Chess Federation and Fridrik Olafsson, an Icelandic grand master.
“Fischer has definitely a winning position,” Olafsson said.
When the game began, the two players brought their own chairs in to the room with only their seconds and started play on a simple wood table in the center. An automatic closed circuit television camera—of the type Fischer had no objections to—recorded what happened inside for the 1,500 spectators in the hall, who did not seem to mind the absence of the players.
Experts said Fischer's position after 30 moves was superior to Spassky's but that the two grand masters were equal. Fischer led in time allotted with nearly a 2-1 advantage toward the close of Sunday's session.
Spassky was in trouble as he pondered his 41st move, which will be sealed in an envelope to be opened when the match resumes at 5 p.m. (noon CDT) Monday. Fischer ended the five-hour playing session on the attack forcing two queen checks in the 38th and 39th moves.
Even Nikolai Krogius, one of the world champion's seconds, admitted Fischer now had a chance to win his first game in the match when the game is finished Monday.
