TMTNW, My Version

In The Match That Never Was, I mentioned,

The Fischer - Karpov match brought back memories. I once constructed 24 unfinished games in an attempt to recreate the same match, which I called TMTNW.

A correspondent asked if I would make the games public. They were created around 1989-1990, I haven't looked at them since, and I'm afraid they wouldn't stand up to analysis. It would also be a pity to see them start showing up in databases as real games between the two players. No, it's better that the games remain unpublished. For the record, here are the first four moves in each imaginary game (I assigned White to Karpov in the first game):-

01 (AK-RF) 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 c5 4.Nc3 cxd4
02 (RF-AK) 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.c4 Nf6
03 (AK-RF) 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 c5
04 (RF-AK) 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 dxe4 4.Nxe4 Bf5
05 (AK-RF) 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6
06 (RF-AK) 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6
07 (AK-RF) 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3 O-O
08 (RF-AK) 1.c4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 b6 4.Nc3 Bb7
09 (AK-RF) 1.Nf3 c5 2.c4 Nc6 3.Nc3 g6 4.g3 Bg7
10 (RF-AK) 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Bd3 Nc6
11 (AK-RF) 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6
12 (RF-AK) 1.c4 Nf6 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 d5 4.Nc3 Be7
13 (AK-RF) 1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.d4 d6 4.Nf3 Bg4
14 (RF-AK) 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 d6 4.Nf3 Nxe4
15 (AK-RF) 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Nf3 Bg7
16 (RF-AK) 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Bxc6 dxc6
17 (AK-RF) 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e3 b6
18 (RF-AK) 1.e4 c6 2.d3 d5 3.Nd2 g6 4.Ngf3 Bg7
19 (AK-RF) 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 c5
20 (RF-AK) 1.c4 c5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.g3 d5 4.cxd5 Nxd5
21 (AK-RF) 1.c4 g6 2.Nc3 Bg7 3.d4 Nf6 4.e4 O-O
22 (RF-AK) 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6
23 (AK-RF) 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6
24 (RF-AK) 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6

At the time I worked on this I had both 'Bobby Fischer's Chess Games' by Robert Wade and Kevin O'Connell (Doubleday, 1972) and 'Karpov’s Collected Games' by David Levy (RHM Press, 1975), so it was easy to compare the repertoires of the two players. The job might be tougher today with the same collections available in electronic format.