BOBBY FISCHER, the brash, unschooled chess genius from Brooklyn who toppled the might of the Soviet chess system before his 30th birthday is the only North American world champion and the only non-Soviet or non-Russian title-holder since the Second World War.

His world championship match against Boris Spassky in Reykjavik in 1972, made him a legend.

The key game of the match was the sixth: it was a revelation to ordinary chess fans and grandmasters alike. Fischer adopted an opening that is standard — the Queen’s Gambit — but one that he had never used before. In his hands it was infused with a fresh force and vigour that had never been detected in this line.

Many champions and grandmasters had tried to break down Spassky’s defences in this variation, but to no avail. Fischer demonstrated with superb élan that the black fortress could be breached.

The game was widely regarded as the most elegant, forceful and incisive in Fischer’s winning of the world title. The Argentine connoisseur, the grandmaster Miguel Najdorf, compared it to a symphony by Mozart.

Harry Golombek, chess correspondent of The Times, who was present, said: “One very nice touch was that Spassky joined in the applause at the end. Fischer, being human, was affected by this but, as he subsequently told a friend, he had to hurry away to hide his feelings.”

Fischer is reported to have said: “What a gentleman Spassky is.” However, he wanted to restrain such feelings for fear that they would interfere with the tigerish quality he regarded as essential for crushing an opponent.

World Championship Reykjavik, 1972

White: Bobby Fischer
Black: Boris Spassky
Queen’s Gambit declined

1 c4 e6 2 Nf3 d5 3 d4

A legend in his lifetime? It is a mark of Fischer’s charisma that such an ordinary move was regarded with amazement at the time. He was known for favouring King’s-side openings almost to the exclusion of everything else, and once remarked that he has never opened with the Queen’s Gambit on principle.

3. . .Nf6 4 Nc3 Be7 5 Bg5 0-0 6 e3 h6 7 Bh4 b6

This is considered one of the most solid ways of defending the Queen’s Gambit, favoured by Spassky and his trainer Bondarevsky.

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