World Cup 2011: Round 2, Day 1

With most of the favorites through, the matches are going to be more closely contested from here on out. Unsurprisingly, there were a lot of draws today, and some were quite short - apparently some players have decided to save energy and make their big push in the rapid playoffs in a couple of days.

That's not at all to say that no one tried; far from it, and the ultimate fighter today was Vassily Ivanchuk, who with Black squeezed Evgeny Alekseev for 97 moves until a blunder finally popped out and he won. Other big guns collecting the full point were Vugar Gashimov (I annotate this game), Teimour Radjabov and Alexander Morozevich. Some 2700s lost, too, including Alexei Shirov (to Vladimir Potkin - I've annotated that game), Etienne Bacrot (to Anton Filippov), and - in unbelievable fashion - Francisco Vallejo Pons, to Lazaro Bruzon. That one almost has to be seen to be believed, so that game also appears in the annotated game link.

All the Americans (and all the "honorary Americans" as well) drew their games.

Links: Official site (with excellent live video coverage) here, Wikipedia brackets here (scroll down), and the three games I annotate are here. (Real annotations, too, at one point verging on the Hübnerian. You're welcome.)

Two Excerpts from the European Rapid Championship

The European Rapid Championship took place in Warsaw this past weekend, and with tons of strong players there were many fine games and exciting moments. Not all the games were so impressive, however - witness this:

Tomasz Markowski (2625) - Radoslaw Wojtaszek (2726) (Round 8):

1.Nf3 d5 2.c4 c6 3.d4 Nf6 4.Qb3 dxc4 5.Qxc4 Bg4 6.Nc3 Nbd7 7.e4 Bxf3 8.gxf3 e5 9.Be3 Bd6 10.0-0-0

This line has fared pretty well for White, but Black's position is certainly playable.

10...exd4

This has only been played once before, by Boris Gelfand against Ruslan Ponomariov in the finals of the 2009 World Cup. Ponomariov recaptured with the bishop and eventually won a hard battle (though he lost the war, as Gelfand eventually won the match and the tournament), but Black was not in trouble at this point.

11.Qxd4

And now Wojtaszek, all 2726 rating points' worth of him, played 11...Qc7?? and resigned after 12.Qxd6. There's hope for us all...or is it that we're all hopeless, at least sometimes?

Here's another one:

(Position after 23...Bg7-h6 in Alexander Moiseenko (2670) - Artur Jussupow (2589), round 13)

White sees the threat of 24...Be3, evaluates it as no big deal, and plays 24.Rxc7. Or rather, 24.Rxc7?? White is only half right: ...Be3 isn't a big deal right now or immediately after a rook trade, but it is in fact a VERY big deal! It just needs a little setting up, that's all:

24...Qxf2+!!

Oops. White resigned after 25.Rxf2 Rb1+, because after 26.Rf1 Be3+ - now! - drives the king into the corner and forces mate in two more moves.

This Week's ChessVideos Show: Viewer Questions

Topics include the anti-Benko/Benoni with 3.e3, material imbalances, the psychology of blunders, the isolated d-pawn and rook endings. There's something for everyone, at least if "everyone" is limited to the sort of crowd likely to watch chess videos. And since this chess video is free (free registration required) and will be available on-demand for the next month or so, "everyone" should be happy.

Endgame Blunders at the Rapid World Championship

Two games from this weekend's Grenke Rapid World Championship caught my eye as examples of what can happen to a player who is pressing for the win and gets excited about his chances - so excited he loses his sense of danger. Have a look.

World Cup Results: Round 1, Tiebreaks

Worst. Chess. Ever.

I've never seen such bad chess from great players with their eyes open, at least not in these quantities. This might be unprecedented.

But first, let me set the stage and discuss today's goings-on. Of the 64 first-round matches, 20 (not 19, as I miscounted earlier) were tied after the two "classical" games. (Or rather, what passes for classical chess now, thanks to FIDE. The time control is 90 minutes for the whole game, with 30 second increments and an additional 30 minutes given after move 40.) It used to be that the first round of tiebreakers was just two rapid (25' + 10") games, but now it's four. If it's still tied after that, then two games at 5' + 3", if still tied than another two at the same time control, and then two more, and then two more...in all, the players are given five blitz mini-matches before they are forced into an Armaggedon game where White gets 5 minutes to Black's 4 minutes + draw odds.

Of the 20 matches, seven were settled after three rapid games, and seven more ended after the fourth game. That left six matches going to blitz, of which all but one - Tregubov-Akobian - ended with a winner. That match seemed to go on forever, before Akobian won three in a row and put Tregubov out of his misery by a 9-7 score.

In the remainder of the post, I'll discuss upsets, games without blunders that caught my eye, and then finally enumerate the blunders I noted. (There may be more.) First, the upsets: Dominguez, Navara and Bacrot survived (in Navara's case with a bit of luck, as he was lost in game 4), but Sargissian lost to Li Chao, Sutovsky lost to Zhou Weiqi and Tiviakov lost to Iturrizaga. (In the other matches, the ratings were close enough that the upsets weren't that significant.)

Next, the good and the interesting. In round 1.3, Shabalov resigned after 12 moves, which struck me as a pretty clever decision. Objectively, he was lost, but he could have kept going. The decision seemed to me motivated by a desire to forget the game as quickly as possible and to rest up and prep for the next game - and it worked!

Moving on to round 1.5, I was impressed by Zhou Weiqi's technique against Sutovsky, found Shabalov-Baklan a very entertaining draw, and was both impressed and amused by Khalifman-Fier. Khalifman's strong play impressed me, while Fier deserved a (sarcastic) good sportsmanship award for continuing around 20 moves down a piece for absolutely nothing against the former FIDE World Champion. In the same round, Negi-Milov was an Evans Gambit, showing the hand of Nigel Short on the young Indian. The disastrous way the game ensued for White might have left Short wishing he could be dead for a moment so he could spin in his grave. Milov declined the gambit and obliterated Negi. Finally, Akobian-Tregubov was an excellent technical win by the American.

In round 1.6, Tiviakov had White against Iturrizaga and theoretically the better chances to win the match, but he missed the nice shot 25...Nf3! and lost the game and the match. Baklan-Shabalov was another crazy game, and at the finish Shabalov had a rook against five(!) pawns. The game was drawn, but I'd be shocked if Shabalov wasn't winning until very near the end. (To his credit, despite all the setbacks I mentioned, Shabalov went on to win this match!) Savchenko-Shulman was funny in its own way, ending with Shulman being forced to give mate with bishop and knight. One of the curious aspects of the game was that it reached a position where Shulman had bishop and knight against a single, thoroughly stopped pawn. Rather than just winning it and giving mate, though, Shulman made 25 pointless moves first and only then captured it. I find it hard to believe a grandmaster of Shulman's caliber - in fact, a grandmaster of any caliber - needs more than the 10 second increments to perform the mate, but it was pretty smart of Shulman all the same. Supposing he gained eight seconds on his clock each time, that gave him an additional 200 seconds, which could come in handy just in case he happened to find himself stumped at some moment or other. My best guess, however, is that Shulman's interest in accumulating all that time had less to do with OTB worries and more to do with taking a restroom break. (If anyone knows, confirmation would be appreciated!)

Now to the blitz rounds. In round 1.7, Akobian obtained two bishops vs. two knights, but it was a candidate for the worst bishop pair ever, and he got crushed. Andreikin-Nyback saw 1.Nc3 e5?!, and Nyback only just held on by a thread. (1...d5! is probably the best response, but anything other than 1...e5 is fine.) In round 1.8, Shabalov tried the Smith-Morra Pawn Loss Gambit against Baklan's O'Kelly Sicilian, and went on to win (though Baklan declined with 4...d3).

On to part 3: blunders! There are so many it's incredible, but rather than describe them here I'll let you see them for yourself - have a look here.

As for results and all the games, you can find them here, while pairings for round 2 are...I don't know where. If someone has seen a nice bracket chart, please post the location in the comments.

Update on Monday, November 23, 2009 at 9:25PM by Dennis Monokroussos

Oops, accidentally left off a game. I'll add that momentarily. (Done it.)

The Worst Chess Nobody Sees

Regular readers of this blog will recall that I often refer to the Bundesliga competitions as the best chess nobody sees. Many of the world's best players participate in leagues, with the German Bundesliga traditionally the strongest of them all, but because the events generally aren't well publicized to the chess community at large and takes place over many months, most fans barely know about it.

That's a pity, but not always. Sometimes, even the greats screw up royally, and on those occasions the comparative obscurity of the Bundesliga is an advantage. So with apologies to Alexei Shirov, one of the best and most enterprising players of the last 20 years or so, you can find a surprising howler of his here.