Greatest English Chess Players

[Joey Stewart]

Ok I guess blackburn can get in there, I will find a spot....

[JustinHorton]

Do give him the e you've taken off Hodgson.

[Joey Stewart]

Do give him the e you've taken off Hodgson.

He got his unnecessary E. I even bumped up Miles a little in the list too.

[Nick Burrows]

Continuing...

Chessmetrics has the English top 5 as

1.Adams
2.Blackburne
3.Short
4.Speelman
5.Nunn

As the other candidates were not in the top 100, only there peak rating seems to be available as opposed to the 3 year rating high used for the top 5.
Interesting as an indication of comparable strength.

McShane 2713
Howell 2712
Staunton 2706
Atkins 2702
Miles 2699
Jones 2671
Hodgson 2652
Penrose 2610
Alexander 2610
Yates 2596

[Matt Mackenzie]

I suppose you could reasonably enquire if Jacques Mieses, Vera Menchik, Imre König, Čeněk Kottnauer plus others were English. Is there a hard and fast definition?

You could probably assert that they were unlikely to have Anglo-Saxon roots.

You might consider them naturalised English, yes (though Konig later became a naturalised American if you want to pursue that line)

Going back to Sultan Khan, he lived most of his life on the subcontinent - with his British years a fairly short interlude in the middle.

So IMO the case for regarding him as "English" is fairly tenuous.

[Nick Burrows]

My attempt at a top 10:

1.Adams
2.Staunton
3.Short
4.Blackburne
5.Speelman
6.Nunn
7.Atkins
8.Miles
9.Penrose
10.Howell

[Mike Truran]

Yates in at 10 (at least). Far too early in Howell's career for him to be included.

His victory against Alexander Alekhine at Karlsbad in 1923 won the brilliancy prize, while his win against Milan Vidmar at San Remo in 1930 was described by Alekhine as the finest game played since the war.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1007974

[JustinHorton]

There's also Amos Burn to consider.

[JustinHorton]

Regarding nineteenth-century players this posting from Tim Harding is extremely informative.

[Mike Truran]

There's also Amos Burn to consider.

Another great suggestion. But who to displace? Can we have a top eleven?

[Martin Regan]

1.Short
2.Adams
3.Staunton
4.Blackburne
5.Speelman
6.Nunn
7.Miles
8.Penrose
9.Atkins
10.Burns

[Michael Farthing]

Well you are all wrong. The greatest ever was Bob Wade. He might not have the same ability but if I had to be wrecked on a desert island with someone to play and learn about chess with it would be Bob Wade.

[IM Jack Rudd]

Not in any databases, you say?

Blackburne was clearly one of the best players of his day. How strong he would be by today's standards, I do not know.

[Jonathan Bryant]

... nobody has ever attempted to create such a list

I doubt that very much.

Type it into google then ....

For clarification, I'm perfectly prepared to believe that you didn't find anything when you googled. What I'm less certain about is "Joey didn't find it" being equivalent to "never existed anywhere"

Earlier on (page 1) you seem to be saying that Penrose was once a candidate for the world championship. When was this then?

I'd have him much lower down the list because although he completely dominated english chess for a long time he never pushed on to the world stage. After Penrose - from RDK on - the British Championship was a stepping stone. For Penrose it seems to have been all he wanted.

I'd have him on the list for sure but lower than Short, Adams and Speelman - all world top 5 players at various points - for sure. Maybe one or two others as well.

[Joey Stewart]

Its a fair point about Penrose, although looking at the quality of his chess am quite confident that he could have been a player on the world stage if he had wanted to be which was why I gave him a slightly inflated ranking . Actually, on the subject, I behind he is still alive - does anybody know where he is now or if he still plays?