Wijk R2: Fighting chess – six decided games, one draw 14.01.2007– Refreshed after their snooze in round one, all the top GMs in Wijk went for blood in round two: Topalov, Kramnik, Aronian and Svidler won their white games, Anand won with black. Poor Magnus Carlsen missed a one-move win and lost against Navara. Yasser Seirawan covered the action on Playchess. Full report with comments and videos.
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Round 2
After the disappointing first round with six draws and a win, Sunday was an
altogether more bloodthirsty day with six decisive results and just one draw
in the A Group. (Interestingly the B Group saw four decisive games and three
draws on the first day and six straight draws today.)
World Champion in Wijk: Vladmir Kramnik
Vladimir Kramnik vs Alexei Shirov: 1-0
A grudge match between two players who have not shared close mutual friendship
for some years. The game was an English in which Shirov suddenly sunk into deep
thought at move seven, allowing a full hour to pass before he decided on a reply.
Kramnik exerted steady pressure which led to an endgame where he is probably
winning, due to the weakness of b4. Shirov shortened the agony by blundering
a piece:
34...Rb7?? and Shirov resigned without waiting for 35.Rxe6
Kxe6 36.Nc5+. 1-0.
Alexei Shirov lost to his arch-rival Kramnik
Veselin Topalov vs Loek van Wely: 1-0
This was another match that lacked amicable overtones. Van Wely had worked with
Topalov in the past, but during the world championship in Elista he had signed
the letter of
grandmasters supporting Kramnik. Topalov demanded an apology from van Wely
but got none. Their game was One of the main lines of the Najdorf English Attack,
6…e6,with castling on opposite sides. The position looked unclear until
25…Kg8? (25…axb3) which allowed 26.Bxc5! Nxc5 27.Qh6!, after which
the attack was too strong.
26.Bxc5! Nxc5 27.Qh6! Kf8 28.Qxh7 Qf7 29.Nd3 axb3 30.cxb3 Nxd3 31.Rxd3
e4 32.Be6 exd3 (going for a counterplay mate in a very difficult position)
33.Bxf7 Rxa2 34.Qg8+ Ke7 35.Kxa2. Naturally, since 35.Qxb8
Ra1 is mate. After 35.Kxa2 Rxg8 36.Bxg8 White is a full rook up. 1-0.
There are videos of the post game analysis by Topalov at the bottom of
the page.
Alexander Motylev vs Viswanathan Anand: 0-1
This game followed a currently popular line of Najdorf Poisoned Pawn. Anand
employed the novelty 14…Qd5! recommended by Kasparov in the latest New
in Chess magazine 2006/8! “White would need a lot of creativity to
prove his point after that,” wrote Kasparov, and Anand proved the point
for his retired colleague. White sacrificed three pawns and never had enough
compensation. Anand fended off Motylev's attack easily, and when his opponent
overlooked a drawing chance, took home the full point.
Now after 28.Rxg7+ Qxg7 29.Bxg7 Kxg7 White can force a draw. But: 28.Qf2?
Rxf7 29.Qxf7+ Kh8 30.Rf2 e5 31.Qd5 Nf6 0-1.
Vishy Anand with a black win in round two
Magnus Carlsen vs David Navara: 0-1
After good opening play in an Exchange Grünfeld White, after a bit of insecurity,
gained a clear advantage. Then came a dramatic turn of events – Navara
blundered and Carlsen did not see it. In the aftermath the 16-year-old Norwegian
actually lost the game. What a tragedy.
Black's last move allows 32.c6! attacking both the rook and the queen. 32.c6
Qxb5 33.axb5 bxc6 34.bxc6 and Black cannot prevent a pawn from queening. Unfortunately
Carlsen did not see this line and instead played 32.a5 a6 33.Qc4 h5 34.Be1
Rf7 35.c6? The youngest GM in the field is pushing too hard, perhaps
out of frustration over the missed win a few moves earlier. bxc6 36.Bc3+
Kh7 37.Qxc6 Qf2+ 38.Kh1 Qf1+ 39.Kh2 Qf4+ 40.Kh1 Qf1+ 41.Kh2 Qf4+ 42.Kh1 g4 43.hxg4
hxg4 44.Qc8 g3 45.Qh8+ Kg6 46.Qg8+ Kh5 47.Qh8+ Qh6 48.Qxh6+ Kxh6 49.Kg1 Kg5
50.Bd4 Rf5 0-1 since the bishop vs rook ending is hopeless for White.
Peter Svidler vs Servey Tiviakov: 1-0
Tiviakov tried a Scandinavian surprise on his Russian opponent, but Svidler
took it in his stride and built up an impressive position after Black had weakened
with 22…exd4?! and 23…Bd6?! In the ending White broke through on
the queenside and established a passed b-pawn, which was enough to win the game.
Levon Aronian vs Ruslan Ponomariev: 1-0
A typical Aronian game – and early queen exchange left White with nagging
queenside pressure, and Black was never able to equalize. A fine positional
victory for the Armenian.
Levon Aronian with a fine positional effort
Teimour Radjabov vs Sergey Kariakin: ½-½ White gained advantage in the middlegame and won material, but faced the
task of breaking down Black’s possible fortress in an endgame with Q+3
v R, B+2, all on same side. Radjabov mistakenly transposed into a drawn Q v
R ending.
58.g5 hxg5 59.fxg5 Bxg5! 60.Qxg5+ Kh7. As Mark Dvoretsky’s
Endgame Manual points out (and the six-man tablebases confirm), the
position is now a theoretical draw – actually it was analysed by Grigoriev
90 years ago! Black shuttles his rook between the two safe squares e6 and h6,
and ensures that his king comes to g7, whenever White threatens Qf8. White can
make no progress.
All pictures by courtesy of Frits Agterdenbos of ChessVista
"I
am notoriously grumpy and critical," wrote René Torenstra of Delft,
Netherlands, "but here is some praise for GM Yasser Seirawan: thank you
so much for your commentary on this server. Without going into chess matters
(I am a genuine patzer), I would like to say that your manner of analyzing games,
with humour, thoughtfulness and a measured pace, stimulates, entertains, and
provides many well-spent hours of pleasure to your listeners. Clearly you are
talented in many fields, backed up by the hard work needed to hone such skills.
Please, don't stop what you're doing!"
He won't, René. And for those of you who were not able to catch it live
on the server, you can listen to Yasser's broadcasts at any time on a pay-per-view
basis (two ducats or about 30 cents per session). The files are to be found
on the Playchess server in the room Chess Media System – Events and
Reports. If you do not have them already you can purchase
ducats here. They can be used to follow GM Seirawan's live broadcasts.
They cost ten ducats (= €1 or $1.30) per round – a very reasonable
rate for hours of excitement and pleasure.
Video
Once again the very active Chessvibes
site has captured a lot of action in video clips:
Anand analysing with Motylev – 9:43 min
Topalov analyses his win in the press centre – 8:08 min
"I
am notoriously grumpy and critical," wrote René Torenstra of Delft,
Netherlands, "but here is some praise for GM Yasser Seirawan: thank you
so much for your commentary on this server. Without going into chess matters
(I am a genuine patzer), I would like to say that your manner of analyzing games,
with humour, thoughtfulness and a measured pace, stimulates, entertains, and
provides many well-spent hours of pleasure to your listeners. Clearly you are
talented in many fields, backed up by the hard work needed to hone such skills.
Please, don't stop what you're doing!"
