First Kotov Position in his book "Think like A Grandmaster"

I don't mind errors, as long as I have fun! Finding the .....Qf3 idea was fantastic! At the time being, I refuse to analyze with engines.  I want to use my brain! It exercises not only my calculation skills, but also my imagination!

Cool! Thanks!

 I'd be interested to see two super GMs play though this in a real game. Mostly I'd want to know how much time white spends on his first move, and how much they thought needed to be calculated before playing the first move.

If Kotov says you should calculate it all before playing the first move, that's ridiculous, IMO. Maybe for training this would be a good exercise, but OTB that would be a waste of time I think.

What game is this position from please?
Every position in Think Like A Grandmaster names the game it comes from.
The first position in the book I have is Euwe-Alekhine 19th Game match 1937

I happen to have a database I can reference quickly.

Here ya go:

Amazing! Thanks!

@godsofhell1235 - Thank you very much indeed. I am rather interested in this "database" you have.
Could you post more about that please?

I have ISBN 0 7134 1807 9 an English reprint from 1980, that book mentions Ryumin-Kan (204)
Clearly the Yanks don't have good connections with the Russians like the Brits ;-)

I have chessbase 2013. Stupidly expensive IMO, but I bought it a few years ago.

it is so hard.

I see. Millions of game that I guess you search through by FEN.
Seems like it is for the serious player who has a need to study opponents style on one level then.
Michael Stean in 1980 (ish) as Korchonoi's second: We have now got all of Karpov's games and we will study them.

I had a look at some analysis of that game.

Some comments from a poster on another site. 

 A controversy now surrounds this game, in particular the position after 25 ... Ng6 which is the 1st position presented in Kotov's classic book think like a Grandmaster.

Here is the post I have just made about it on Chessworld.net:-

Alexander Kotov in his classic renowned chess book "Think like a Grandmaster" advocoated looking at the way machines think - especially in relation to tactical variations.

Curiously on the rec.games.chess.misc newsgroup recently, the very first position that Kotov presents in his famous book is question for the variations examined- in particular the deliniation of candidate moves.

Kotov gives the following candidate moves:- 

a) Bxh6 
b) Nxg6 
c) Ng4 with idea of Nxh6+ 

Nxf7 is curiously missing - and this actually goes against a fundamental principle emphasised by the book of allowing a "brainstorming" process of candidate moves- not rejecting moves too early.

I remember looking at Kotov's book and not being able to digest it. It was a unique experience in that way....

Books that are dry I cannot handle too well.

The OP looks like one of those positions from Martin Weteschnik's very excellent book, Chess Tactics from Scratch where he talks about how dangerous it is to have the same-side's King and Queen on the same rank or file and how it's sometimes easy to set up a pin of the Queen against the King. I don't have the time to find it but a double attack seems also possible here.

In this case a real quick 1 Bxh6 gxh6 2 Nxg6 fxg6 3 Rxg6 forks the K and Q - but I just looked at Kotov's book and that doesn't work.

If there's a hole in that attack, 1 Nxg6 fxg6 2 Bxe6 wins the exchange, at least, but Kotov says 1...Bxg3 is good for Black.

1 Ng4 can work.

That Nxf7 was missing doesn't necessarily translate to the move being summarily rejected. The only way you can know that is by asking the player with the white pieces about his thought process during the calculation. For all we know, Nxf7 isn't here because it was not even considered as a candidate move by the player or Kotov forgot to include it in his book.

Kotov simply missed a very good candidate move when making the point that he was making was the need to find all the good candidate moves.

To be frank, the whole book was not all that great but some was OK, not really worth the $100 in today's money that I paid for it all those years ago from a Chess point of view. 

But, he was not a bad raconteur.

A sort of Russian Yasser.

https://youtu.be/I7oxBA_QFEw