Levente Lengyel (13 June 1933 – 18 August 2014) was a Hungarian chess player, who gained the Grandmaster title in 1964.
Lengyel gained the title of International Master in 1962 and became a Grandmaster in 1964. His final published rating from the international chess federation FIDE was 2293, although he had not been active for a number of years. At his peak, he was regarded as a strong grandmaster, competing for his nation at the top level and winning medals. He died in Budapest in 2014.[1]
Lengyel played for Hungary in six Olympiads between 1960 and 1970. His most notable results were:
His overall Olympiad record was 41 points from 70 games.[2]
Lengyel also played in the European Team Chess Championship three times between 1961 and 1970.[3] His results were as follows:
Lengyel also played in the 1964 Amsterdam Interzonal, a preliminary round of the World Chess Championship, achieving 12th place with 13/23, 1.5 points short of qualifiying for the candidates matches (the winner was Smyslov with 17).[7]
Lengyel had wins against former World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik,[8] but perhaps his two most memorable results were two games which finished in somewhat unorthodox fashion:
Portisch - Lengyel, Málaga 1964, where he achieved a stalemate draw with a spectacular queen sacrifice.[9]
In the left-hand board position (after 52. f4) Lengyel played 52... Qg4+! 53. Kh6 (53. Kxg4 is stalemate and 53. Kf6 is met by 53... Qe6+ with stalemate if the queen is taken, otherwise the game will end in perpetual check) Qg5+!! after which any of the three captures of the queen leads to stalemate.
Darga - Lengyel, Amsterdam 1964, where Darga resigned in a clearly winning position.[10]
In the right-hand board position (after 41... R6xe2+) Darga played 42. Resigns??, instead of 42. Rxe2 Bxh4+ 43. Ke3 where White should win with his additional material. It appears that both players missed that 43. Ke3 would be possible.