1975: The Master Game Final - Speelman vs Hartston | BBC Archive

[Paul Macklin]

Uploaded today by the BBC's Archive channel. The first Master Game final. Features substantial contributions from Leonard Barden. https://youtu.be/UUAJfB6tGgc?is=TtKLp73mLsV2oIsm

[Matt Mackenzie]

Hartston won the following series as well - the first two were all-British affairs.

The third outing became international, and saw Karpov beat Miles.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

"Oh dear, it's happened" (Hartston on the opening)

[Roger de Coverly]

"Oh dear, it's happened" (Hartston on the opening)

Another memorable comment was John Nunn threatening to diagonalise someone. That made it to a Bill Tidy cartoon with a caption "Police seek Bishop".

[Nick Ivell]

Jeremy James. Not a clue what was going on.

[Roger de Coverly]

Jeremy James. Not a clue what was going on.

Wasn't that the point? He represented the casual player audience, to ask that question of Barden or Hartston.

[Matt Mackenzie]

ISTR he once admitted he was basically a beginner at chess, he also presented bridge programmes around then and seemed to know a bit more.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

I did like Hartston's dryly humourous comments about some of the theory being in his book, but it was probably wrong. And Speelman saying simply "what a load of rubbish" about his own play. It was really good to hear Leonard speaking, I am not sure I had ever heard him speak before! (I may have missed the bootleg copies of these programmes when on YouTube before, glad the BBC Archives are putting them up now, hopefully more later). How old is Speelman there, and how old was Hartston?

PS. Also a brief glimpse of P.H. (Peter Hugh) Clarke.

[John Hickman]

Ennio Morricone - Come Maddalena (Disco 78 Mix)

[Matt Mackenzie]

Speelman has just turned 70, and was only 19 then. Hartston would have been 28 I think.

[Brendan J Brown]

Jeremy James was a class act. Nice to see some insights on the psychological side of chess from Leonard Barden. I’m going to use that Smyslov technique to screw in the pieces after moving. I’m bound to gain 100 ELO. Didn’t realize Jon Speelman invented the Rambo look as well.

[John Upham]

I gather JPS's headband was inspired jointly by JP McEnroe and BR Borg

JP McEnroe and BR Borg and headbands

3bde33aa9f061ccc1a681fe748e82672.jpg (75.67 KiB) Viewed 106 times

[NickFaulks]

"Oh dear, it's happened" (Hartston on the opening)

Another Hartston comment I remember vividly ( so I hope it did happen! ) was "oh dear, I've got only one piece off the back rank and it's my king". Black in a Czech Benoni, playoff game perhaps, but now I am stretching.

[IM Jack Rudd]

Black Knights' Tango rather than a Czech Benoni, but yes. Third game against Botterill in the first series semi-final.