Béla Berger was a Hungarian-Australian chess

Chess

Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...

 master.

He took 5th in the Hungarian Championship

Hungarian Chess Championship

The inaugural Hungarian Chess Championship was held in the city of Győr in 1906. Initially, there was no governing body responsible for its organisation, until the formation of the Hungarian Chess Federation. The HCF first appeared in 1911, but failed to establish itself properly until 1923...

 at Budapest 1953 (Béla Sándor won). In 1954, he played for Hungary "B" at fourth board in 1st Triennial Cup in Budapest.

After the failure of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, Berger left Hungary for Australia, where he won the New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

 state title in 1957 and 1961. He played in the Australian Championship

Australian Chess Championship

The Australian Chess Championship is a tournament organised by the Australian Chess Federation and held every two years. The tournament is usually restricted to Australian chess players, although exceptions have been made on occasion. The winner of the tournament holds the title of Australian Chess...

 in Sydney in 1958/59, finishing second with 11.5 points, behind Lajos Steiner

Lajos Steiner

Lajos Steiner was a Hungarian–born Australian chess master.Steiner was one of four children of Bernat Steiner, a mathematics teacher, and his wife Cecilia,, and a younger brother of Endre Steiner...

's 12.5.

National champion John Purdy

John Purdy (chess player)

John Purdy was an Australian chess player and Family Court judge.- Early life and education :John Spencer Purdy was born on 25 September 25 1935 in Sydney, New South Wales...

 was one of Australia's two representatives at the 1963 Pacific Zone 10 Championship in Jakarta

Jakarta

Jakarta is the capital and largest city of Indonesia. Officially known as the Special Capital Territory of Jakarta, it is located on the northwest coast of Java, has an area of , and a population of 9,580,000. Jakarta is the country's economic, cultural and political centre...

. There was a quadrangular selection tournament in Melbourne for the second spot. Bela Berger and Karlis Ozols

Karlis Ozols

Kārlis Ozols was a Latvian-Australian chess player.Ozols represented Latvia on eighth board in the unofficial Chess Olympiad, at Munich 1936, where he won the individual bronze medal. He also played on fourth board in the 7th Olympiad at Stockholm 1937.In 1937, he tied for 17-18th in Kemeri...

 tied for first; the selectors voted in favour of Berger 3-0.

In Jakarta, he tied for first with Indonesia's Arovah Bachtiar on 5.5/8, and won the playoff 2-1 after 3 games. A fourth game was won by Bachtiar, but it had no bearing on the outcome, as the tiebreak system used favoured Berger. As zonal champion, he became an International Master.

He went on to play in the 1964 Interzonal

Interzonal

Interzonal chess tournaments were tournaments organized by FIDE, the World Chess Federation, and were a stage in the triennial World Chess Championship cycle.- Zonal tournaments :...

 tournament in Amsterdam, with 18 grandmasters and 6 international masters, finishing 23rd out of 24. The joint winners were Vasily Smyslov

Vasily Smyslov

Vasily Vasilyevich Smyslov was a Soviet and Russian chess grandmaster, and was World Chess Champion from 1957 to 1958. He was a Candidate for the World Chess Championship on eight occasions . Smyslov was twice equal first at the Soviet Championship , and his total of 17 Chess Olympiad medals won...

, Bent Larsen

Bent Larsen

Jørgen Bent Larsen was a Danish chess Grandmaster and author. Larsen was known for his imaginative and unorthodox style of play and he was the first western player to pose a serious challenge to the Soviet Union's dominance of chess...

, Mikhail Tal

Mikhail Tal

Mikhail Tal was a Soviet–Latvian chess player, a Grandmaster, and the eighth World Chess Champion.Widely regarded as a creative genius, and the best attacking player of all time, he played a daring, combinatorial style. His play was known above all for improvisation and unpredictability....

 and Boris Spassky

Boris Spassky

Boris Vasilievich Spassky is a Soviet-French chess grandmaster. He was the tenth World Chess Champion, holding the title from late 1969 to 1972...

.

Berger tied for 7-8th at Manila 1968 (Meralco Open, Svetozar Gligorić

Svetozar Gligoric

Svetozar Gligorić is a Serbian chess grandmaster. He won the championship of Yugoslavia a record twelve times, and is considered the best player ever from Serbia...

won).

In 1991, he won a short match against Charles Pizzato (2 : 0).

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