World Chess Championship 1984

1981-82 Zonals

There were three different paths to the Interzonals. First, players qualified from twelve different Zonals. Second, some players (including Kasparov) qualified on rating. Third, the six quarter-final and semi-final losers from the previous Candidates in 1980 qualified.

1982 Interzonals

Three Interzonal tournaments were held. The top two finishers in each qualified. Zoltán Ribli won the Las Palmas Interzonal ahead of 61-year-old former world champion Vasily Smyslov. Kasparov, 19 years old, won the Moscow Interzonal by a 1½-point margin ahead of Alexander Beliavsky. The Toluca Interzonal was won jointly by Lajos Portisch and Eugenio Torre.

Tal and Andersson contested a playoff in Malmö for a reserve spot for the Candidates Tournament. The match ended 3–3; Tal became first reserve because of his better tie break score, but no reserves were needed.

1983–1984 Candidates Tournament

The six Interzonal qualifiers were joined by Viktor Korchnoi and Robert Hübner, the Candidates finalists from the previous cycle (World Chess Championship 1981). The eight players participated in a series of knockout matches. The winner was Garry Kasparov.

The Smyslov–Hübner match was tied at 5–5. After playing four extra games without breaking the tie, the match was resolved by a spin of the roulette wheel. The ball went into the zero on the first spin, before deciding in favor of Smyslov.

Politics threatened Kasparov's semi-final match against Viktor Korchnoi, which was scheduled to be played in Pasadena, California. Various political manoeuvres prevented Kasparov from playing Korchnoi in the United States, and Kasparov forfeited the match. This was resolved when Korchnoi agreed for the match to be replayed in London, along with the Vasily Smyslov–Zoltán Ribli match. The Korchnoi–Kasparov match was put together on short notice by Raymond Keene. Kasparov won 7–4.

1984–1985 Championship match

The previous record length for a world title match had been 34 games, the 1927 match between José Capablanca and Alexander Alekhine, which also followed the "first to 6 wins" format.

Out of the first nine games, Karpov won four, and he then won the next decisive game, leading the match 5–0 by game 27. But then he could not win another game (and thus win the match) for twenty games, by which time Kasparov started gaining ground. The long stretch of fourteen draws after game 32 led to a dilemma for the organizers, who were in difficulties to secure a new playing venue for an indefinite period time as the lease on the Hall Of Columns had already expired. On January 31, Kasparov won his second game against Karpov in game 47. As the venue was being changed to the Sport Hotel, game 48 was postponed.

FIDE President Florencio Campomanes called for a meeting with Karpov and Kasparov and suggested that the match be limited to eight more games, and if no result emerged then a new match would be held in September 1985. Kasparov was represented in this meeting by the leader of his delegation Yuri Mamedov, who conveyed that Kasparov wanted to continue the match, but that he would tell Kasparov about Campomanes's proposal. Jury Chairman Alfred Kinzel took on Campomanes's role as negotiator after Campomanes went to Dubai to organize the upcoming Chess Olympiad.

According to FIDE General Secretary Lim Kok Ann, on February 4 Kasparov conveyed to Kinzel that he was willing to end the match only if it was terminated immediately. Kasparov stated that he objected to Campomanes's proposal and said "If the rules are being changed anyway, why then do we need to play these extra games?" Kasparov stated he rejected the proposal as it meant that winning the match would require winning every second game, and that Karpov would be able to play for wins without risk. Kasparov also said that his comment was taken out of context, in order to present him as having been the one to want to end the match. Kok Ann stated that Kinzel then approached Karpov, conveying a new proposal to end the match immediately. Karpov rejected this proposal and said that he would only agree to ending the match immediately if the new match started with a 5–2 score, representing Karpov's current lead in the current match. In game 48 on February 8, Kasparov scored a second consecutive win. Karpov, who hadn't won a game in three months, appeared to be exhausted. On February 11, Kasparov took a time out. On February 13, the USSR Chess Federation sent a message to Campomanes, proposing that the match be paused for three months, citing concerns about the health of the players, and that the match would resume with the current score of 5–3 for Karpov.