The changing of the guard in the world of chess was achieved not by smash-and-grab play, but by herculean displays of patience

Chess may not seem suited to radio, but in the Sixties the BBC broadcast special programmes featuring the world’s greatest ever players

Borislav Ivanov’s gadget-enhanced attempt to cheat his way to sporting success could have been lifted from a James Bond film

Leonid Stein was a virtuoso player whose unexplained death at 38 robbed the world of his otherworldly attacking brilliance

The softly spoken Cornishman Michael Adams weaves webs around his opponents and strikes when it is too late for his encircled

Lothar Schmid was a great referee and a remarkable man: a former lawyer and grandmaster himself, he had the respect of even the respect of even the most temperamental of players

Chess championships in England are often played in dreary municipal halls in grey provincial towns. So I jumped at the chance to compete in 5-star comfort in Thailand

Vladimir Kramnik best games display a fusion of elegance and force that give the impression that this is as well as chess could be played

Gennadi Sosonko's intimate personal knowledge of the Soviet Union's greatest grandmasters is unrivaled — and he was a useful player himself

London's forthcoming Candidates tournament features the world's best, including the highest-ranked player in history, Magnus Carlsen