Lasker, Emanuel VS Capablanca, Jose Raul 1914.05.18

Annotations

At St. Petersburg 1914, World Champion Emanuel Lasker met José Raúl Capablanca in the Exchange Variation of the Ruy Lopez — one of the most celebrated games in chess history. Capablanca annotated the game himself in Chess Fundamentals (1921); his original notes, now in the public domain, are reproduced below.

1. 4.Bxc6 The object of this move is to bring about speedily a middle-game without Queens, in which White has four Pawns to three on the King's side, while Black's superiority of Pawns on the other side is somewhat balanced by the fact that one of Black's Pawns is doubled. On the other hand, Black has the advantage of remaining with two Bishops while White has only one.
2. 7…Bd6 Black's idea is to Castle on the King's side. His reason is that the King ought to remain on the weaker side to oppose later the advance of White's Pawns. Theoretically there is very much to be said in favour of this reasoning, but whether in practice that would be the best system would be rather difficult to prove. The student should notice that if now all the pieces were exchanged White would practically be a Pawn ahead, and would therefore have a won ending.
3. 8…Ne7 A perfectly sound form of development. In any other form adopted the Black Kt could not be developed either as quickly or as well. K2 is the natural position for the Black Kt in this variation, in order not to obstruct Black's Pawns, and also, in some eventualities, in order to go to KKt3. There is also the possibility of its going to Q5 via QB3 after P-QB4.
4. 10.f4 This move I considered weak at the time, and I do still. It leaves the KP weak, unless it advances to K5, and it also makes it possible for Black to pin the Kt by B-QB4.
5. 10…Re8 Best. It threatens B-B4; B-K3, Kt-Q4. It also prevents B-K3 because of Kt-Q4 or B4.
6. 11…f6 Preparatory to P-QKt3, followed by P-QB4 and B-Kt2 in conjunction with Kt-Kt3, which would put White in great difficulties to meet the combined attack against the two centre Pawns.
7. 12.f5 It has been wrongly claimed that this wins the game, but I would like nothing better than to have such a position again. It required several mistakes on my part finally to obtain a lost position.
8. 13…Bb7 Played against my better judgment. The right move of course was BxB. Dr. Lasker gives the following variation: 13...BxB; 14 RxB, P-B4; 15 QR-Q1, B-Kt2; 16 R-B2, QR-Q1; 17 RxR, RxR; 18 R-Q2, RxR; 19 KtxR, and he claims that White has the best of it. But, as Niemzovitch pointed out immediately after the game, 16...QR-Q1 given in Dr. Lasker's variation is not the best. If 16...QR-B1! then White will have great difficulty in drawing the game.
9. 15.Nd4 It is a curious but true fact that I did not see this move when I played 13...B-Kt2, otherwise I would have played the right move 13...BxB.
10. 15…Rad8 The game is yet far from lost, as against the entry of the Knight, Black can later on play P-B4, followed by P-Q4.

José Raúl Capablanca, Chess Fundamentals (1921) · Public domain · source