Dortmund 2018, Round 2

Greetings again, Caissaic comrades! We're back again with Round 2 coverage of Dortmund, with this round featuring a bit more blood than yesterday.

 The game Meier-Giri, however, certainly did not provide any hemoglobin for viewing pleasure. Meier is known for having a very technical style that often verges towards peaceful, and Giri is almost notorious for his ability to force draws and avoid danger. (As an aside, as to the latter, this strikes me as particularly unfair - Giri has a tremendous sense of humour about these aspersions, so he doesn't actively attempt to disperse these barbs, but his rating and results deserve far more than chuckles. He's one of the best players in the world, and 99.9% of players can't even imagine playing up to his level.) Meier (via his usual 1. Nf3 move order) deployed the Catalan, which in my eyes is in need of a major rejuvenation - Black has discovered quite a few equalizing methods against this once feared squeezing weapon, and it's been quite awhile since I've seen Black in any form of trouble in a top level game. The game quickly zoomed towards opposite coloured bishops and an efficient liquidation towards peace.

Nisipeanu-Duda (the Battle of the Hyphenation) finished quickly as well, but with a decisive result. Nisipeanu chose a 3. Bb5+ Sicilian, and the game found its way to one of the biggest traditional main lines of the Rossolimo. Duda was the first to play an offbeat move, with 10...Ng8 being a very strange choice (10...Ne4 is by far the usual choice, with hundreds of master games). I'm not sure if this discombobulated Nisipeanu, but the game took a strategically interesting path - Duda very confidently castled queenside, and the game was set for a fascinating battle with central pressure, dueling outposts, and opposite side pawn storms. Suddenly, however, Nisipeanu dropped a pawn! I'm not sure if this was a sacrifice, or a failure to recognize that 19. b4 g4 20. b5 is an in between move that maintains the balance. Whatever it was, Duda snatched off the pawn and very confidently converted his material edge with zero counterplay.

The most incredible game of the day has to be Wojtaszek-Kramnik. Kramnik took a break from his usual QGD/Semi-Tarrasch adventures to give the Nimzo a try, and Wojtaszek tried a slightly offbeat Bg5/e3 mixture that has recently seen a couple of outings in top flight chess - it is most notorious for featuring in last year's game Bai Jinshi-Ding Liren, which in my eyes was the most beautiful game of 2017 (which I have listed in the game link in the notes, if you haven't partaken of the aesthetic experience). This game took a much more tranquil course, with Kramnik turning the tables on his usual Semi-Tarrasch adventures and taking on an isolated but passed d pawn for himself. The game was following a logical course, with Black perhaps having a slightly better side of a draw...and Kramnik suddenly sacrificed his queen! Kramnik had a high profile explosion of overly optimistic decisions in the recent Candidates tournament (which produced some slightly harsh but hilarious memes), and this decision certainly continues the trend. Neither player handled the resulting imbalance in the most efficient way, and the evaluation pingponged between equal and better for White. Wojtaszek seems to have missed a clear chance for an edge with 41. Qf6 (the move after the time control - a somewhat cursed move number!), and immediately afterwards the players found their way to a repetition.

Finally, the game Kovalev-Nepomniachtchi was another Rossolimo, with White transitioning from a Lopez style structure to a bit of a Meran/c3 Sicilian structure. White never really gained anything from the opening, with his pawns on a5 and e5 allowing outpost squares more than really cramping Black. 26. Nxe6 essentially turned out to be a fancy transmutation of material, with White gaining a knight, rook, and pawn for a queen. I'm surprised Nepo allowed so much liquidation - he very quickly traded into an ending where White has bishop, rook, and two pawns for the queen. There were a couple of moments where Nepo appears to have been in real danger, and Kovalev was always playing "for two results only". Kovalev missed some opportunities to test Nepo more thoroughly, but with a completely open board and the queen's propensity for sudden checking mechanisms (see yesterday's Nepo-Giri game!) making technical progress would have been quite difficult. Peace was agreed to on move 90.

Games here.

Dortmund 2018, Round 1

[Note from DM: You're in for a treat! I'm going to be busy with this and that for a couple of weeks, so you, dear readers, are in for an upgrade. Enjoy!]

Greetings, fellow chess enthusiasts! My name is John Cole, and for the next couple of weeks I'll be helping out Dennis by temporarily taking the reins of his esteemed blog. As a brief introduction: Dennis and I are both Indiana residents and both slightly antiquated, quasi-retired FIDE Masters. We share an admiration for Kramnik and share a dislike of existentialism, and we've both grown slightly stodgier in our playing style after the fiery tactical skirmishes of our youth.

Today marked the kickoff of the beloved Dortmund tournament, a chess symposium that has regularly come together since 1973. The most prominent regular competitor, of course, is Vladimir Kramnik, who is justly celebrated for having won the event a record 10(!) times. His next closest rivals to success this year are Anish Giri, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Jan Krzysztof-Duda, and Radoslav Wojtaszek. In my eyes, Krzysztof-Duda is a very notable participant to watch – he has recently overtaken Wojtaszek as not only the Polish champion but the #1 rated Polish player. He's a very young and brilliant player, but possesses a very mature style – gone are the “old days” of the cliché of the young firebrand tactician who can be worn down by a wily positional veteran. Krzysztof-Duda has a completely universal style, and could absolutely prevent Kramnik from adding to his abundance of accolades. Grizzled tournament veterans Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu, Vladislav Kovalev, and Georg Meier round out a small but potent field.

Today's round featured very cautious and cagey play in all four games. The least interesting of the quad was Kramnik-Nisipeanu – Kramnik went into a QGD Exchange, and Nisipeanu made a interesting psychological decision by using a top level drawing line that Kramnik himself has used somewhat frequently. Kramnik was the victim of a very high profile drubbing in this line on the Black side at the hands of Carlsen in the 2016 edition of Norway Chess, but in today's game Black was nowhere close to defeat. Nisipeanu varied from Kramnik's play against Carlsen with 12...f5 instead of the previous 12...Nb6. The pawn structure for both sides eventually got mangled into various tangles with no remaining breaks and nothing to do but sign the peace treaties.

Nepomniachtchi-Giri featured the Petroff, a solid Black choice that will only continue to gain in popularity with Caruana's steady advocacy. White's response seemed somewhat milquetoast after 9. Nc3 – White took on doubled c pawns, was deprived of his light squared bishop, and didn't achieve c4 to liquidate his pawn weaknesses. However, Giri allowed genuinely dangerous attacking chances with 18...b4?! (better is 18...Rcd8 with a typically solid Petroff position) – Nepo could have instantly retorted with 19. Bxh6! gxh6 20. Qxh6 with a dangerous attack, as 20...Qd6 is met with the nasty 21. Re6! with an inferno on the kingside. However, Nepo let this pass, and the game drifted into a fairly equal queen endgame. However, a moment of drama was reserved for Giri's choice of 46...Qxa4?? (initiative almost always matters more in queen endings than material - 46...Qc2+ keeps the draw secure), when 47. d6 Qc2+ put White on the verge of pushing through. However, 48. Kf3? returned the game to a draw - 48. Ke3! allows White's king to eventually escape the checks.

Wojtaszek-Meier featured an English Defense, a very rare guest at the top of world chess. Wojtaszek chose 4. e4, which looks quite natural but is currently theoretically quite sound for Black (4. a3 is considered to be more challenging, with d5 to follow). Meier's choice of 6...e5 looked like it might inject the game with fervor, but the game quickly went into a Maroczy structure with some minor pieces traded off (which typically is favourable for the defending side). Even with Wojtaszek's choice of queenside castling, Black's restraint structure of d6 and f6 prevented any pawn breaks and kept the game well within equality.

Finally, Duda-Kovalev featured a strange Rubinstein from White - Duda's early choice of Nf3 eliminates a lot of favourable delayed Saemisch plans that White might otherwise utilize. Black gained a fairly comfortable position with hopes of a light squared bind, but 17...Nd6 seemed unnecessarily flamboyant. White had at least a symbolic advantage against the doubled pawns, but the structural weaknesses on the light squares made progress very problematic. White eventually left Black with five(!) pawn islands, but couldn't find a way to break through. More detailed game analysis with the included link, and we'll see you for Round 2!

Game link here.

Dortmund Underway

Vladimir Kramnik's favorite event starts today: the Sparkassen Chess-Meeting in Dortmund, Germany. He has won the tournament 10 times, but not since 2011. Can he win it this year?

Here are the pairings for round 1, which is underway:

• Wojtaszek (2733) - Meier (2628)
• Duda (2737) - Kovalev (2655)
• Kramnik (2792) - Nisipeanu (2672)
• Nepomniachtchi (2757) - Giri (2782)

Radoslaw Wojtaszek is the defending champion. While Kramnik is the rating favorite (by a small margin), I expect Ian Nepomniachtchi to win the event. Normally I'd say Giri, but at the moment he might be in a spot of trouble against against Nepo; further, his results against Kramnik are typically pretty poor, and he's going to have Black against him in round 6. Also, Nepo has White against Kramnik in round 5, so the tournament sets up very well for him. But we'll see, and it's a bit ungenerous to go against the defending champion - maybe Wojtaszek will make it back-to-back titles.