Happy New Year 2010 and Late Dec Winners

Happy New Year 2010!!

Here a list of late December winners, in Russian Superfinal Men, Peter Svidler narrowly missed the title to Alex Grischuk by half point. This maybe blamed to Svidler lost to Sjugirov in a Caro Kann miniature. Meanwhile the tournament see another miniature and an interesting one.

Vitiugov,N (2694) - Khismatullin,D (2643)
62nd ch-RUS Moscow RUS (9), 2009.12.29

(show chess board)(hide chess board)

In Women category, Alisa Galliamova also narrowly clinched the title from Nadezhda Konsintseva by half point. Alisa had been dominated the tournament with only three draws on 9 rounds. Natalia Pogonina must withdrew early due to illness. Comprehensive report from TWIC.

In Groningen Open Group A, young Illya Nyzhnyk (13 old!) finished first with 7.5 point. Second are Jan Werle Dmitri Reinderman with 6.5. Illya gets his title and second GM norm. Shame he did not met the other teenage Anish Giri who finished with 6 points. Don't missed this young and dangerous player, Illya Nyzhnyk.

Old Jan Timman wins his latest match against Robin van Kampen, 2.5-1.5. Timman is at 2591 and van Kampen 2470. TWIC conclusion here.

In 19th Pamplona International, Georg Meier is ahead of other 9 players to bring home a title. Second are GM Julio Granda Zuniga, who with Viktor Laznicka and Kiril Georgiev must surrender the title to Meier eventhough all have a tie 6 points. TWIC presentation here.

In closer to Asia, GM Antonio Rogelio Jr. wins a friendly 3rd Knights and Kings gathering, ahead of Wesley So (4th), Rolando Nolte (3rd), and Ali Branzuela (2nd). See nice story from Chessheroes.

Meanwhile still a busy up coming week:
Hastings UK- http://www.hastingschess.org.uk/
Reggio Emilia Italy- see TWIC if you can't do Italian.
the Rilton Cup Sweden- http://www.rilton.se/
World Open Leon- http://www.openmundialdeleon.com/
World Team Champ Turkey- http://wtcc2009.tsf.org.tr/

Asian Team Championship Final

Asian Team Chess Championship 2009 held in Kolkata concluded this afternoon. Round 7 sees India A has another perfect score against lower rated Srilanka. Iran fight a rather hard team, India B but get a wins to secured their third position. Meanwhile Vietnam is in second position after they only need to play another lower rated Nepal. Indonesia team get a consolidation win over Yemen and stands in fourth position. Singapore must satifsy with 3.5-0.5 score against Bangladesh. The first board GM Wu Shaobin take a half point while all the rest Singaporeans failed to get another point. Terry Chua fight the last game with R vs R+P endgame against GM Murshed Niaz. The following are round 7 result for Men section:

Bo. 9 SRILANKA - 1 INDIA A 0 : 4
1.1 Hapuarachchi H L M 2019 - GM Sasikiran Krishnan 2664 0 - 1
1.2 Edirisinghe Dulan 2137 - GM Ganguly Surya Shekhar 2654 0 - 1
1.3 Kalugampitiya R S 2135 - GM Negi Parimarjan 2620 0 - 1
1.4 Wijesuriya G Luxman 2089 - GM Deepan Chakkravarthy J 2518 0 - 1
Bo. 3 IRAN - 4 INDIA B 3 : 1
2.1 GM Ghaem Maghami Ehsan 2603 - IM Adhiban B 2486 1 - 0
2.2 GM Moradiabadi Elshan 2560 - IM Satyapragyan Swayangsu 2480 ½ - ½
2.3 GM Mahjoob Morteza 2510 - IM Sengupta Deep 2488 1 - 0
2.4 IM Toufighi Homayoon 2454 - IM Himanshu Sharma 2469 ½ - ½
Bo. 2 VIETNAM - 10 NEPAL 4 : 0
3.1 GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son 2616 - Karmacharya P, Man 2015 1 - 0
3.2 GM Bui Vinh 2488 - Pandey Sajan 0 1 - 0
3.3 GM Dao Thien Hai 2524 - Shrestha Rajendra Prasad 1982 1 - 0
3.4 GM Nguyen Anh Dung 2447 - Shrestha Sujendra Prasad 2084 1 - 0
Bo. 6 BANGLADESH - 7 SINGAPORE 3½: ½
4.1 GM Rahman Ziaur 2545 - GM Wu Shaobin 2454 ½ - ½
4.2 GM Murshed Niaz 2409 - FM Chua Zheng Yuan Terry 2256 1 - 0
4.3 FM Moh. Abdul Malek 2290 - FM Lo Kin Mun Dominic 2174 1 - 0
4.4 Ahmed Mahtabuddin 2171 - Tan Weiliang 2168 1 - 0
Bo. 8 YEMEN - 5 INDONESIA ½ :3½
5.1 Abdullah Sonbul 0 - IM Purnama Tirta Chandra 2417 0 - 1
5.2 FM Fouad Mofleh 2199 - FM Novita Anjas 2340 0 - 1
5.3 FM Faraj Yahya 2280 - Kaisar Jenius Hakiki 2227 0 - 1
5.4 Al-Aqrabi Saleh 2201 - CM Farid Firman Syah 2249 ½ - ½

So the final standing represented very much to their seeding prediction but Indonesia manages to gets in fourth place while seed as no.5 and Srilanka in 8th position while expected to be in 9th. Final position:

1. (1) INDIA A................ 14 156,0 101,5
2. (2) VIETNAM............ 11 145,0 102,5
3. (3) IRAN..................... 11 103,0 94,5
4. (5) INDONESIA .........8 65,0 91,5
5. (4) INDIA B ................ 8 57,0 87,5
6. (6) BANGLADESH..... 8 56,0 84,0
7. (7) SINGAPORE......... 4 42,0 102,0
8. (9) SRILANKA ........... 3 12,0 96,5
9. (8) YEMEN................. 2 18,0 85,0
10. (10) NEPAL ...............1 12,5 87,0

Top Five Boys by point:
Name-Rating-Country-Points/Games-Percentage-Board
1. GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son 2616 VIE 6,0/7 85,7% 1
2. GM Sasikiran Krishnan 2664 INDIA A 5,5/6 91,7% 1
3. GM Negi Parimarjan 2620 INDIA A 5,5/6 91,7% 3
4. GM Ganguly Surya Shekhar 2654 IND A 5,0/6 83,3% 2
5. GM Bui Vinh 2488 VIE 5,0/6 83,3% 2

Women
Meanwhile Vietnam girls finished strongly in first place. Second place is India A who take a bye turn, since the number of girl teams is an odd 9 teams. Iran played a strong round to defeat nearest rival India B with 3-1.

A bit tragic for Indonesia but strong finish for Singapore as the later defeated their neighbour by 2.5-1.5. In this match, WGM Irene K. Sukandar gets a winning endgame in active Knight versus Black's Bishop who operated by WFM Jeslin Tay. But in another board the young Baiq Vina Lestari lost in time in unresolved position against WFM Liu Yang. WFM Dewi Citra lost to WFM Victoria Chan and Chelsie Monica Sihite drew to Christabel Neo.

WFM Liu Yang - Baiq Vina Lestari 1-0
34..Bd4+ final position, Black lost on time
computer give White a plus sign

Final position for Women section :
1. (3) VIETNAM ..................13 129,5 95,5
2. (1) INDIA A .....................10 120,5 83,0
3. (4) IRAN .......................... 9 118,5 80,5
4. (2) INDIA B ..................... 9 89,0 94,0
5. (6) SINGAPORE .............. 8 74,5 83,0
6. (7) BANGLADESH .......... 6 42,0 74,5
7. (5) INDONESIA................ 4 58,0 85,5
8. (8) SRILANKA .................. 3 12,0 80,5
9. (9) NEPAL ......................... 1 0,0 86,0

Against their seed prediction Vietnam is the big winner here. Singapore also finished strong while Indonesia and India B must satisfy to be two ranks lower than their seed.

Top Five Girls by point:
Name-Rating-Country-Points/Games-Percentage-Board
1. WGM Nguyen Thi Thanh An 2334 VIE 5,5/6 91,7% 2
2. WIM Pham Le Thao Nguyen 2295 VIE 5,5/7 78,6% 1
3. WGM Pourkashiyan Atousa 2306 IRAN 5,0/6 83,3% 1
4. IM Harika Dronavalli 2467 INDIA A 4,5/5 90,0% 1
5. IM Tania Sachdev 2399 INDIA A 4,5/5 90,0% 2


Men’s
1st Board : Gold Le Quang Liem (Vietnam)
2nd board : Gold: K Sasikiran (India)
3rd board : Gold: Surya Sekhar Ganguly (India)
4th Board : Gold : Parimarjan Negi (India )
5th board : Gold Nguyen Anh Dung (Vietnam )
Women’s
1st board Gold : D Harika (India )
2nd board Gold : Pardar Shadi (Iran )
3rd board Gold: Nguyen Thi Thanh An (Vietnam )
4th Board Gold : Nguyen Thi Mai Hung (Vietnam )
5th Board Gold: Hoang Thi Nhu Y (Vietnam )

Full result from chess result. Indonesian report at Potret Catur and Singapore report here.

Asian Team Championship-Round 6

India A won the Tata Steel Asian Team Chess Championship 2009 Men's section. India A get 12 match points after finishing Singapore 3.5-0.5 in round 6, while nearest rivals like Vietnam and Iran still at 9 match points. In round 6 Indonesian's men join the misery company, suffering a 4-0 lost to Vietnam.

GM Megaranto face a well known GM Le Quang Liem, the game went in classical battle of Nimzo India Defence with bishop pair vs knight+bishop. Black slowly outplayed in this positional game.

Most exciting game is IM Tirta Chandra Purnama vs GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son. Black played an intrique bishop sacrifice 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Nc3 dxc4 5.a4 Bf5 6.Ne5 e6 7.f3 Bb4 8.e4 Bxe4!? and force White's king to flee his comfortable square in the next moves. White again gains much promising attack in kingside but a weak 36.b5? spoiled everything.

Play online chess

GM Bui Vinh played an aggresive early Trompowsky's Bishop vs FM Anjas Novita and wins. While Farid Firmansyah get out of a promising Ruy Lopez opening but soon went into lost position and jumped into a mate pattern by GM Nguyen Anh Dung who played the Black side. This concluded a 4-0 victory by Vietnam but the result is very much reflected to their respective rating, as condolence words...

The Indonesian Women team also lost 3.5-0.5 with only WGM Irene manage to secured half point over WGM Le Thanh Tu whom several points above Irene. Live and replay games http://www.asianteamchess09.com/livegames.asp

Men's Standing after round 6:
1.INDIA A ............. 12 118,0 75,0
2.VIETNAM ......... 9 108,0 76,0
3.IRAN.................. 8,0 66,5
4.INDIA B .............8 43,0 58,5
5.INDONESIA...... 6 48,0 71,5
6. BANGLADESH 6 38,0 60,5
7. SINGAPORE.... 4 35,0 74,0
8. SRILANKA....... 3 10,0 62,0
9. YEMEN............ 2 14,0 60,5
10. NEPAL ...........1 10,5 56,5

Women's Standing after round 6:
1. VIETNAM...... 11 97,5 73,5
2. INDIA.............. 9 82,5 70,5
3. INDIA B ..........9 71,5 63,5
4. IRAN................ 7 75,5 53,0
5. SINGAPORE.... 6 51,5 60,0
6. INDONESIA.... 4 39,5 60,5
7. BANGLADESH . 4 27,0 57,5
8. SRILANKA ........ 3 6,0 61,0
9. NEPAL............... 1 0,0 55,0
Annotation:
Tie Break1: Matchpoints (2 for wins, 1 for Draws, 0 for Losses)
Tie Break2: Olympiad-Sonneborn-Berger-Tie-Break
Tie Break3: Buchholz Tie-Breaks (variabel with parameter)

Full result see here.


Final Round 7 pairing:
MEN 1
SRILANKA (3) vs INDIA A (12)
2 IRAN (9) vs INDIA B (8)
3 VIETNAM (9) vs NEPAL (1)
4 BANGLADESH (6) vs SINGAPORE (4)
5 YEMEN (2) vs INDONESIA (6)

Women
1 NEPAL (1) vs VIETNAM (11)
2 IRAN (7) vs INDIA B (9)
3 INDONESIA (4) vs SINGAPORE (6)
4 SRILANKA (3) vs BANGLADESH (4)
5 INDIA A (9) Bye

Perebutan juara pertama di Kejuaraan Beregu Asia Kolkatta musti diakhiri setelah India A berhasil mencapai 12 match point. India A mengalahkan Singapore di babak 6, sementara Iran dan Vietnam masih bertahan di nilai 9. Vietnam yang menjadi lawan Indonesia di babak 6 gagal dibendung dan mempertahankan tradisi 4-0 di tiap babak. Partai pertama Megaranto berlangsung ketat dan positional tapi Megaranto yang bermain hitam dengan Nimzo indian defence pelan-pelan kehilangan kontrol dan kalah.

Partai paling seru ada di papan IM Tirta Chandra lawan pecatur muda Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son. Si Nguyen bermain tajam korban Gajah di pembelaan mirip-mirip Slavia tapi juga mirip Gambit Menteri di terima ini. Sementara siaran langsung lainnya GM Bui Vinh juga main tajam melawan Anjas Novita. Sedangkan Firmansyah pelan-pelan juga gagal membendung lawan GMnya. Hasil ini kurang lebih tercermin dari rating lawan Indonesia yang semuanya jauh di atas pemain Indonesia. Hal yang sama juga tercermin di regu puteri yang juga kalah 3.5-0.5, hasil seri dipetik WGM Irene.

Partai terakhir adalah Indonesia vs Yemen, yang kemungkinan besar bisa jadi ajang balas dendam atas hasil kemarin, dan di bagian puteri Indonesia melawan tetangga terdekat Singapora. Yang jauh lebih penting dari mengejar ketertinggalan dari Vietnam adalah sekarang bagaimana agar tidak terkejar oleh Singapore.

Selamat Hari Natal dan Tahun Baru 2010.

Christmas 2009 Full of Chess

Merry Christmas to everyone, may peace and joy fill everyone heart. But some GMs and WGM just can't had enough peace because they need to find a good move in their chess game! This holiday season see a lots of event to be watched.

First to mentioned is the continuation of Asian Team Championship in Kolkata. The event is a battle between 10 teams from Asia. Up to round 5 top standing for men :
.....................TB1 TB2 TB3
1. INDIA A - 10 84,0 52,0
2. VIETNAM - 7 63,0 51,0
3. IRAN - 7 51,0 53,0
4. INDONESIA - 6 38,0 43,0
5. INDIA B - 6 34,0 45,5
6. BANGLADESH- 4 27,0 48,0
7. SINGAPORE- 4 24,0 43,0
8. SRILANKA- 3 8,0 38,0
9. YEMEN- 2 6,0 38,0
10.NEPAL- 1 4,5 41,0

For women :
.....................TB1 TB2 TB3
1. VIETNAM - 9 65,0 49,0
2. INDIA A - 7 53,5 49,5
3. INDIA B - 7 50,5 47,5
4. IRAN - 5 50,5 37,5
5. SINGAPORE - 5 34,5 48,5
6. INDONESIA - 4 30,0 35,0
7. BANGLADESH - 4 25,0 34,5
8. SRILANKA - 3 6,0 35,5
9. NEPAL - 1 0,0 32,5
Tie Break1: Matchpoints (2 for wins, 1 for Draws, 0 for Losses)
Tie Break2: Olympiad-Sonneborn-Berger-Tie-Break
Tie Break3: Buchholz Tie-Breaks (variabel with parameter)

Full result see here.

The tournament see a dramatic imbalance between high rated team and the low rated with 4-0 score in every round. The recipient of this perfect score is either Nepal or Srilanka. Round 5 Women see Indonesian team facing India B. WGM Irene draw with WGM Mary Ann Gomez in Sicilian games. After the exchange both side reach a rook and opposite bishop position. Both girls shake hand realizing no significant improvement for both side.

Next to Irene, all the Indonesian girls lost to India. WFM Dewi Citra played the longest game with WIM Padmini Rout. Both have a passed pawn standing in a square next to promotion square, but Black has a King to support his pawn while White doesn't. White resign in 62 moves.

Last position of WFM Dewi Citra vs WIM Padmini Rout 0-1
WGM Irene vs WGM Mary Ann Gomes 1/2-1/2

In Men area, Round 5 see Indonesia keep the 4-0 tradition to Nepal team. Vietnam also quickly in 3-0 score playing Bangladesh , GM Le Quang Liem wins over GM Rahman Ziaur. The last board and longest for round 5 is a battle between GM Bui Vinh and FM Abdul Malek. Both reach a 2P+ opposite Bishop position but the score read the Vietnamese wins it, so 4-0 for Vietnam vs Bangladesh. Live games here.

Other great tournament is a RUSSIAN SUPER FINAL, which after round 5 Grischuk is on top with 3.5 above Svidler and Vitiugov with 3.0 . The young Sjugirov is making headline with a 20+ move win over Svidler. In Women section Alisa Galliamova is in perfect 5/5 , second by N. Kosintveva with 4/5. See LIVE game here.

In Holland, the Groningen 2009 also had great LIVE chess to be watched, Jan Timman is playing Robin Van Kempen and also a strong group A open.

In Sweden there is Rilton with LIVE tranmission here.

And of course the Battle of Giant reaching conclusion here. Spassky and Korchnoi is back in match and their score is equal with both wins each other.

And that's our chess menu for this holiday season.

Asian Team Championship Round 2

Second round of Asian Team Chess Championship see another 4-0 results around. Singapore Men and Women went berserk to score perfect point against Nepal team. Indonesian Women team also join in with the same score against Srilanka. In Men section, India A defeated India B with 3.5-1.5, Iran drew Vietnam with GM Ehsan Ghaem Maghami take point from GM Le Quang Liem, but second board GM Elshan Moradiabadi must surrender to another young talent GM Nguyen Ngoc Truang Son.

Indonesia succesful defeated quite strong team Bangladesh. Bangladesh's two GMs are GM Rahman Ziaur, who must admit point to GM Megaranto Susanto. The second GM Murshed Niaz split point with IM Tirta Purnama. FM Anjas Novita get to bring his opponent into winning endgame for Black (Anjas), and after 59.Kg1 ? Black finished the game with beautiful tactic :

59.. f3! 60.gxf3 Rb4!
61.Kf1 {61. Rg2+ Kxf3 62. Rf2+Ke3 63. Kg2 Rb2} Rb1+ 0-1
to see Black goes to Rb2 for sure

Last board Kaisar Jenius Hakiki also defeated his FM opponent who defend in Pirc setup.

Full round 2 result :
Men
India B - India A ½ : 3½
Vietnam - Iran 2:2
Bangladesh - Indonesia ½:3½
Nepal - Singapore 0:4
Yemen - Srilanka 2:2

Women
Iran - India A 1:3
India B - Vietnam 1:3
Nepal - Singapore 0:4
Indonesia - Srilanka 4:0

Full pairing here. Live : http://www.asianteamchess09.com/livegames.asp

Asian Team Chess Championship 2009

The Asian Team Chess Championship 2009 is begin. The event also called a Tata Steel Asian ...... is running from 20th to 29th December in Kolkata. About 9 countries form a team of men and women to compete in this two groups. India is sending two team. The A team is composed of lower rating to up to 2600 rated players. Highest seed is India A with Harikrishan, gangulu, Parimarjan all 2600 rated and only Deepan in 2518. Vietname also in strong contender with Le Quang Liem and Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son above 2600+. Iran with one 2603 rated Ghaem Maghami Ehsan and that's it, all the rest are below 2600. And also they are spared because other strong Asian team like Chinese is probably busy preparing to play the World Team Champ in Turkey very soon. Also not sure why Phillipine did not join in.

Indonesia team composition are :
1. Megaranto Susanto GM 2522
2. Purnama Tirta Chandra IM 2417
3. Novita Anjas FM 2340
4. Kaisar Jenius Hakiki - 2227
5. Farid Firman Syah CM 2249

and

1. Sukandar Irine Kharisma WGM 2304
2. Lestari Baiq Vina - 2170
3. Dewi Aa Citra WFM 1938
4. Sihite Chelsie Monica WCM 1971
5. Medina Warda Aulia WCM 1959

For women , the "all stars" (Irene,Dewi,Chelsie and Medina) to be played their "debut" as a team, with Lestari joining the team. Their first round is a hard one against top seed India A and lost 2.5 - 1.5 with following result :

IM Harika Dronavalli - WGM Irene Kharisma Sukandar 1-0
WGM Karavade Eesha - Baiq Vina Lestari 0-1
WGM Soumya Swaminathan - WFM Dewi Aa Citra 0.5-0.5
WGM Nadig Kruttika - WCM Chelsie Monica Sihite 1-0

Baiq put a great game with White against her WGM opponent's Sicilian (Updated):

Play chess online

Meanwhile the Indonesia men joined a first round massacre with 4-0 win over Nepal team. Other clearance are Iran to Yemen 4-0 and Srilanka - India B 0-4. Full result here.

Singapore men team face a strong Vietnam with 0.5-3.5 in Vietnam favor. GM Wu Shaobin failed to stop young star Le Quang Liem and only Tan Weiliang manage to save a half point against GM Dao Thien Hai. The Singapore women have consider a good start against India B with 2-2. All the girls (WFM Jeslin Tay, WFM Liu Yang, WFM Victoria Chan and Christabel Neo) managed to clinched a half point from their over 200 rated opponents.

Live game in Monroi platform here. Official web here.

Korchnoi-Spassky Battle of Giant

Victor Korchnoi is back in action but this time he is not to play teenage or girls. His opponent today is also an old hand , the tenth world champion Boris Spassky. The match to be held yesterday to 27th Dec in 8 games.

First game won by Victor Korchnoi who played white side against a Nimzo Indian defence.

Play online chess

Full official story here :


In December of this year will be held in Elista chess match between the tenth world champion Boris Spassky (France) and "eternal challenger, Viktor Korchnoi (Switzerland), to commemorate the 400 th anniversary of the Voluntary Entering of the Kalmyk people in the Rossiyskogo state.
Boris Spassky - the tenth world champion, won the chess crown in a dramatic duel with Tigran Petrosian, who gave it in turn to the great Bobby Fischer. B. Spassky - a brilliant chess player and a brilliant psychologist, has always referred to play on peaking, and often preferred to draw the game to win, even in the worst position. B. Spassky was not an innovator in the debut, although it may be noted one component of chess, in which the tenth world champion was not just strong, but noticeably superior to all his contemporaries. Playing in a complex multi-figure middlegame! A wonderful sense of coordination figures, the ability to choose the best moment to strike. When it is necessary to continue strengthening the position and when it is time to attack - these questions B. Spassky decided at the board almost flawlessly. At an intuitive level.

Viktor Korchnoi - the oldest of the currently playing grandmasters in the world. In his 78 years, Victor L. actively participates in various chess tournaments. With 60 years of XX century Korchnoi is a contender for the title of world champion, he is considered the strongest chess player, never won the crown of world champion in chess. V. Korchnoi, winner of more than sixty international competitions - a brilliant connoisseur of debuts and endgame positions. For sixty years, both have played a match between a total of 69 official games. V. Korchnoi won 22 of them, 15 on account B. Spassky, and 32 ended in a peaceful outcome. The last meeting took place masters 10 years ago in St. Petersburg, their native city, during the celebration of 275 anniversary of St. Petersburg University.

Then the landslide victory won 6:4 V. Korchnoi, winning 65% of the prize fund of 12 thousand dollars. The initiative of the President of FIDE, Head of the Republic of Kalmykia KN Ilyumzhinov to hold the match V. Korchnoi and Boris Spassky, on the 400-Anniversary of Voluntary Entering of the Kalmyk people in the Rossiyskogo state, with prize fund of U.S. $ 20 000 in Elista was supported by the Congress of FIDE. The match will take place in the meeting hall of the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan from 17 to 27 December in 8 rounds. December 22, the day of rest, will blitz tournament with the participation of veterans of chess in Kalmykia and 10 invited veterans of chess from Moscow and St. Petersburg. In good tradition for the audience in the lobby of the party would comment on the international grandmasters Alexander Nikitin and I. Zaitsev.

http://chess-rk.ru/