Russian Team Championship: A Final Batch of Games
Saturday, May 9, 2015 at 1:25PM
Dennis Monokroussos in 2015 Russian Team Championship

In my previous post on the Russian Team Championship, I covered games through round 6 of its 7 rounds, so in this wrap-up I'll look at games from the final round. There was one noteworthy game from round 6 that I missed - Motylev-Najer - so that is included as well.

The first six games I include from round 7 are more from amusement than anything else. In the match between "Bronze Horseman" and "University" all six games were drawn, all quickly and as part of an obviously prearranged deal. The games are thus included as a sort of public service. If you're playing your best friend or a relative, and to make a draw need a serviceable game that goes more a handful of moves, you can borrow one of these six to get the job done.

The remaining games are "real" ones and are interesting for different reasons. Nepomniachtchi-Sjugirov was a lively game that finished with a spectacular move, Kamsky-Shirov was a good fight in a classic rivalry, and Khismatullin-Murtazin was the triumph of the underdog - and in a game that decided the match in his seriously outrated team's favor.

The games are here.

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