Can Karpov be considered as the greatest positional player of all time?

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Karpov vs Kamsky Linares 1991, Nimzo-Indian Defense: Huebner Variation. Main Line (E41) · 0-1
If anyone asks me, how grandmaster level play looks like, I will show him/her this game.
This is my favorite game by far, what do you guys think about this game?

of course he is, is a great game, my favourite by far as well. He is one of the bests players of all the time.

Karpov went to the city I live (Vigo) a few months ago and played against the mayor :)

Pre-engine era, yes.

Of course he can, just look at his fantasting way to play and his ability to make all of his pieces work

Yes, he can. Not saying he's the default No. 1, though - Capablanca and Rubinstein for example were also excellent positional players. Petrosian might also be in the mix, but I'd rather consider him a superb tactician who chose to play positional chess.

@Wittke said in #7:
> Petrosian might also be in the mix, but I'd rather consider him a superb tactician who chose to play positional chess.

Who, Karpov or Petrosian? I think the superb tactician is supposed to be Karpov, grammatically you seem to talk about Tigran, though.

I had a look at that game. Yes, very impressive. Karpovs King moves look so weird but keep everything together.
You always have the impression Karpov's point b6 must fall sooner or later. You need an immense tactical power to figure out how to defend it. And 81. ... Rd6 is just beautiful. He offers the rook letting his king envision the white queen and rook naked - and still ist faster with his attack.

"Greatest" is a matter of taste. What he may in fact have been though was The Most Positional Player Ever...ie, a guy who seemingly looked schematically (rather than by calculation of variations) at most any position.

@Sybotes said in #8:
> Who, Karpov or Petrosian? I think the superb tactician is supposed to be Karpov, grammatically you seem to talk about Tigran, though.

Karpov indeed is a very strong tactician, but as you deduced, I was talking about Petrosian. You have to be very good tactically to be such a strong defender - and he also knew when to strike himself.