1927 World Championship Match

[PaulWeaver]

Years ago in Chess Life and Review I read that "Alekhine changed his style for the match and played the most conservative chess of his life because his natural enterprising style had failed miserably in his prior meetings with Capablanca." At chessgames.com someone pointed out that "Alekhine out-capablancaed Capablanca." These remarks are positively dead on! Other salient points: Capa played 1 e4 only once in the match and Alekhine defended 1 d4 with the Queen's Indian only once. These guys were stubborn and going with their best stuff: 1 d4 and defending with 1 ... d5 and the Queen's Gambit Declined 2 ... e6. Beating Capa was unbelievably tough for Alekhine. Having played through games 1, 11, 21, 32 and 34 I can say this with a somewhat qualified opinion. It was pointed out that he should have given Capa remark during '30 or '31 when he was playing the best chess of his career. It would have been quite a match!