The Daily Update: St. Louis, Havana, Lublin, Tbilisi and Gran Canaria

Lots of chess!

1. In St. Louis, Nakamura equalized the scores in his match with Ponomariov, winning with Black in another King's Indian. Nakamura chose a quieter line than in game one, though Ponomariov seemed extremely well-prepared this time too. White had a nice position out of the opening once again, but perhaps Ponomariov's exchange sac wasn't as strong as he hoped. Nakamura eventually returned the exchange for an extra pawn, and went on to win a queen ending.

In the other match, Finegold played another sideline against the Sicilian (the Moscow Variation). Robson maintained his composure and rough equality, and after 23...b4 White had nothing better than to force a perpetual. Robson leads that match 2-1.

2. It seems to have been a day off at the Capablanca Memorial in Havana; the last two rounds will take place Friday and Saturday.

3. Lublin: Shirov drew today, as did most of the competitors. Only Zhigalko won, dropping the strangely hapless top seed Wojtaszek to -3. Shirov leads with 4/5, with Zhigalko half a point behind.

4. Tbilisi: This was the site of the European Individual Women's Championships. Viktorija Cmylite took first with 9/11, half a point ahead of Antoaneta Stefanova and a point ahead of Elina Danielan and Svetlana Matveeva (the former took the bronze on tiebreaks).

5. Gran Canaria: The Bahia Feliz tournament is ongoing and stars Vallejo Pons (the top seed and the event's only 2700), along with a couple of intriguing players: old-timer Enrique Mecking and youngster Ilya Nyzhnyk. After 7 of 9 rounds, Vallejo and Nyzhnyk lead with 5 points, with Ragger, Hertneck and Mecking a point behind.

Candidates Final: Game 1 is Drawn

And a good, hard-fought draw at that, despite Alexander Grischuk's having White. (Perhaps this is just part of his strategy: he wants to wear Boris Gelfand out, even with the White pieces, before the blitz.*) Gelfand had some deep preparation in the unofficial theme opening of this year's Candidates' event, the Queen's Gambit Declined, but even so he had to sweat it out in an ending where Grischuk's queenside majority gave him some practical winning chances. Good defense from Gelfand and the sober "truth" that all rook endings are drawn saved him, and tomorrow he'll have his chance to make Grischuk sweat. We'll see.

For now, here's today's game, with my notes.

* For those of you wondering if I've lost my mind or if I've ingested too much Adorjan, and forgotten that it's advantageous, all things being equal, to have White, I'm alluding to Grischuk's semi-absurd White games against Kramnik in their rapid playoff.

Candidates Final: A Preview of the Gelfand-Grischuk Match

Boris Gelfand and Alexander Grischuk start their match in just a few hours. It's a best-of-six game match this time around (not counting the rapid and blitz tiebreaks, if necessary), and I hope that whatever the result, Grischuk either loses or wins a game before the tiebreaks this time around. It strikes me as slightly absurd that he could win the entire Candidates event without winning a single classical game. Of course, it's also true that no one beat him that way either, and to get this far he had to make it past the top two seeds by rating.

Anyway, let's have a look at their past record. They've played each other 45 times by my count, and in classical they've broken even: +4 -4 =11. Most of the more recent decisive games have been in Grischuk's favor, though the very last classical win was Gelfand's, in the Russian Team Championship in April of 2010. In rapid and blitz, fuggedaboutit. In rapid, Grischuk leads 4-0 in wins, with eight draws. In rapid blindfold, Grischuk has a win and two draws. Finally, in blitz, Grischuk leads +4 -2 =4, though here too Gelfand can at least console himself with having won their last blitz game.*

So with Grischuk's better track record against Gelfand, better physical condition and at least equally strong nerves, I expect him to win the match unless Gelfand has some great idea when he's White that finally breaks Grischuk down. Otherwise, I expect more of the same anti-chess: hold with Black, barely try with White, and then win in rapid or blitz. I'm rooting for Gelfand, but I can't rationally pick against Grischuk at this point.

* I realize that those totals only make it to 44, but I'm too sleepy to go through the database again to see what I missed or miscounted. Maybe some kind soul will put the appropriate correction in the comments?

Candidates Semi-Finals, Tiebreak Games

For the sake of completeness I've included them here, with brief notes.

The Daily Update: St. Louis, Havana, Lublin

In St. Louis, both matches' games ended in draws. Ponomariov seemed to equalize without any real trouble with Black in a Berlin sideline, while Robson-Finegold was a Philidor that ended in a perpetual check after 29 moves. Thus Ponomariov and Robson lead their respective matches with 1.5-.5 scores.

In Havana, Andreikin-Le Quang Liem and Dominguez-Ivanchuk were drawn, while Navara ground down poor Bruzon in 82 to win with Black and move into a tie for first. Le, Navara and Andreikin share first with 4.5/7, putting them a point ahead of Ivanchuk, two points ahead of Dominguez and three points ahead of Bruzon with three rounds to go.

Finally, I was unaware of the 3rd Lublin Union Memorial tournament until "Andrey" wrote me about Alexei Shirov's performance there, but do have a look: he's playing some spectacular chess. Shirov leads this 8-player round-robin with 3.5/4, a point ahead of Grachev, Roiz, Zhigalko and Sasikiran and a full two and a half points ahead of top seed Radoslaw Wojtaszek.

Capablanca Memorial Update

In addition to the Candidates and the St. Louis matches, there's a third ongoing event of general interest in the chess world, and that's the 46th Capablanca Memorial in Havana, Cuba. Here are the current standings after 6 of 10 rounds in this double round-robin event:

1-2. Le Quang Liem, Andreikin 4

3. Navara 3.5

4. Ivanchuk 3

5. Dominguez 2

6. Bruzon 1.5

Games, more info and further links here.

Ponomariov, Robson Win Match Openers

The St. Louis Chess Club is sponsoring a pair of concurrent matches featuring their resident stars Hikaru Nakamura and Ben Finegold taking on outstanding opponents. In Nakamura's case, it's 2002 FIDE Champion Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine, while Finegold is facing 16-year-old American GM Ray Robson, who was a late substitute for Viktor Korchnoi.

I was there for the first game (and even participated in the live video commentary for 15-20 minutes during the second hour with Jenn Shahade and John Donaldson), but I'm not going to take any responsibility for jinxing the locals, who both lost. Ponomariov-Nakamura was a King's Indian, and "Pono" did what few of Nakamura's previous opponents could do: make progress on the queenside without allowing Black a whiz-bang smash-'em-up attack on the kingside. Ponomariov seemed to be better even before 21...Nf6, but there's no question about the situation afterwards - the move was an error, and after 22.Nxd4 exd4 23.e5 White was probably winning. It took a long time to convert, though, as the game went 70 more moves, with Nakamura only throwing in the towel when mate was imminent in the king + bishop + knight vs. king ending.

Finegold-Robson also saw the loser suffer a long time before the metaphorical axe finally fell. Finegold played the 2.c3 Sicilian, and chose the little-known 12.cxd4 (12.Qxd4 is well-known and deeply worked out). As a long-term approach, it doesn't look very good for White, but Finegold hoped that Black's difficulties in unraveling on the kingside would give him some chances. Maybe there are some improvements to be found, but by move 21 (if not sooner) it seems clear that White's approach had failed. After 21.a3 White has no attack, but plenty to worry about - he has gaps on the light squares on the queenside and his isolated d-pawn is a passive target, while Black's powerfully centralized queen and control of the c-file give him a large and persistent advantage. Maybe with computer-like defense White can hold such a position (though I doubt it), but for humans it's practically impossible against a player with strong technique. Robson was up to the task, and finished the game with a mating attack.

Fortunately for Nakamura and Finegold, these aren't Candidates' matches, and they'll have a bit more time to fight their way back. More info on the Club site, here.

On another note, I'd like to say that the club is really beautiful. It's large (three stories), bright, elegantly furnished, very well-maintained and in a nice area as well. One can only hope that the club thrives for many years to come, and becomes a model for similar clubs elsewhere.

Candidates Semi-Final Tiebreaks: Grischuk, Gelfand Advance

As in the quarter-finals, what had been a sedate, sleepy series of classical games turned into action and adventure in the playoffs. And again, as in the quarter-finals, the rapid phase of Kramnik's tiebreak was a snooze before things heated up in the blitz. But the really exciting match wasn't Grischuk-Kramnik but Gelfand-Kamsky.

After a couple of draws, the third rapid game was a big jolt for Gelfand, who lost with White. He missed a nice but simple tactical shot in the opening, and lost his queen for a mere rook. He struggled on for a while (who wants to resign after 16 moves?), but it was in vain. All Kamsky needed to do was draw the last rapid game, with White, and he would be in the finals. He couldn't do it! Gelfand rose to the occasion and won, and having won and forced the blitz playoff, he closed the match out with two more win. A heartbreaking finish for Kamsky, and a great achievement for Boris Gelfand.

As for the Grischuk-Kramnik match, it was somewhat comical. With White in the rapid games, Kramnik would push pretty hard, and in game 3 he had Grischuk on the ropes. When Grischuk was White, however, he didn't even try. In the fourth and final rapid game, Grischuk actually offered a draw on move 8(!!), which was of course accepted.

In this way, I suppose both players were happy. Kramnik got a free pass with Black, while Grischuk got to go to the time control most in his favor: blitz. Sure enough, Kramnik went awry in the first blitz game - with White, naturally - and Grischuk scored the only win of the match. When Grischuk was able to hold in the last game, despite the "disadvantage" of the white pieces, he joined fellow "G"-man Gelfand in the final.

It's a pretty remarkable result, especially for Grischuk, who received the least votes in the ChessVibes poll before the Candidates, though it's not really so surprising in the big picture. He has been a great, known talent for a dozen years, making it to the semi-finals of the FIDE World Championship in 2000, when he barely lost a very hard-fought match against Shirov.

But more on the final match later, and likewise with the annotated games. (Probably not for a day or two, though - life intervenes.)

Candidates Semi-Finals, Day 4

Gelfand-Kamsky finished quickly, and without anyone missing any wins. They repeated the Gruenfeld line from their second game, and of course Kamsky varied first rather than walking into the same terrible bind. Mass exchanges soon followed, and by move 23 it was already time to call it a day.

Kramnik-Grischuk was a far more complicated affair almost from move 1. Even labeling the opening is complicated: it started as an English, but then transposed into a known anti-Sicilian line. Both men played very risky chess, and both players missed winning possibilities. Kramnik did most of the pushing and was generally the one playing for a win, but in the end Black's dangerous passed c-pawn saved the day.

As a result of today's draws, and the fact that all eight semi-final games have been draw, it's on to tiebreaks tomorrow. Someone has to win a game sometime, right?

Meanwhile, today's games, with my comments, are here.

Three Puzzles

We haven't done this for a while, so I'll conclude this overly blogful evening with three puzzles for your solving pleasure. The first two are interesting studies recently published in Chess Today, and the third is the conclusion of a recent blitz game I won.

C. Bent, 1969: White to move and draw.

P. Romanovsky: White to move and win.

Monokroussos-NN: White to move and win.

Solutions here.