World Chess Championship 1972

World Chess Championship 1972
 
Defending champion

Challenger
 
Boris Spassky
Boris Spassky
Bobby Fischer
Bobby Fischer
  Soviet Union Boris Spassky United States Bobby Fischer
 
Scores12½
  Born 30 January 1937
35 years old
Born 9 March 1943
29 years old
  Winner of the 1969 World Chess Championship Winner of the Candidates Tournament
  Rating: 2660[1]
(World No. 2)
Rating: 2785[1]
(World No. 1)
← 1969
1975 →

The World Chess Championship 1972 was a match for the World Chess Championship between challenger Bobby Fischer of the United States and defending champion Boris Spassky of the Soviet Union. The match took place in the Laugardalshöll arena in Reykjavík, Iceland, and has been dubbed the Match of the Century. Fischer became the first American born in the United States to win the world title, and the second American overall (Wilhelm Steinitz, the first world champion, became a naturalized American citizen in 1888). Fischer's win also ended, for a short time, 24 years of Soviet domination of the World Championship.

The first game was played on July 11, 1972. The last game (the 21st) began on August 31, was adjourned after 40 moves, and Spassky resigned the next day without resuming play. Fischer won the match 12½–8½, becoming the eleventh undisputed world champion. The game was covered on ABC's Wide World of Sports and W.N.E.T. Channel 13 in the United States.[2]

  1. ^ a b Chess Informant 14, pp. 299–316.
  2. ^ Play May Be Televised