Efim Bogoljubov
- November 27, 2025
Defeated in two World Championship matches (1929, 1934)
Chessmetrics Ranking: World Number One for two months in 1927
Tournament Career: winner of 11 super-tournaments:
2x winner of the USSR Championship
winner of Karlovy Vary 1923, Moscow 1925, German Chess Congress 1925, Berlin 1926
and several others…
Chess Olympiads: individual silver medal on the first board
What earned him this:
Every connoisseur of Indian games surely knows the name of another chess star on our list – Efim Bogoljubov. Bogoljubov was a chess player who came from the territory of today’s Ukraine, which during his lifetime was part of Tsarist Russia and later the Soviet Union. However, Bogoljubov moved to Germany and played for this country until the end of his life. He was heavily criticized for joining the NSDAP; people who knew him claimed that he was only formally a member of the party to avoid trouble and so his children could study. He was known to be a passionate opponent of communist ideas, which led to his condemnation in his original homeland, and he could not return there. According to those close to him, he held the same disdain for Nazi ideas.
Bogoljubov’s best years were marked by both world wars. During this period, he was consistently one of the best players in the world and won strongly contested tournaments, for example, in Karlovy Vary he tied with Alekhine and Maróczy, dominated the German Chess Congress ahead of Nimzowitsch, Rubinstein, and others, and in Moscow 1925 he even won ahead of two world champions Lasker and Capablanca and many other elite players. His consistent results earned him the position of the best player in the world briefly in 1927 according to historical rankings.
This fact was reflected in his challenge for the chess throne. Unfortunately for him, the world champion at that time was Alekhine – a player he never quite managed to handle. Twice within five years, they played for the world championship title, and neither time was Efim particularly close to victory.
Best Games:
Efim Bogoljubov vs Siegbert Tarrasch
Breslau 1925
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Miroslav Janeček graduated in English Philology at Palacký University Olomouc. Currently he works in Prague as a content editor for a large marketing company. His roots are in Opava - the historic and cultural centre of the Czech part of Silesia. That city is also the home of Slezan Opava, the chess club where Miroslav started to play chess, later went on to work as a youth coach and which he to this day proudly represents. As an aspiring chess publicist, he is the main author of articles on ChessDB.cz. In his free time, in addition to chess and writing, he also devotes himself to racket sports, history, and literature.