R4 Impressions

GM Yuriy Kuzubov

     Four rounds are already behind in the EICC in Minsk. Only one player is on 100%- GM Yuriy
Kuzubov of Ukraine, with many players following with 3,5p/4. There were some very interesting games yesterday. I will show some fragments of the games which have impressed me the most.

     Russian GM- Maxim Matlakov showed a really impressive level of preparation vs Pavel Ponkratov. I have the feeling that it was a very well placed opening trap. My engine is going nuts in the following position, giving a big advantage for black. After I play it's first line- it says it's already equality, to finally give an advantage for white after some good minutes of thinking:

Black to move

     The last move was 11.h4. Black answered with 11...gxh4 12. Qg4- Be5 13. Ne4- all first line moves, after which white has a big advantage. What can I say? This is the risk of playing sidelines nowadays- you never know where a novelty is hidden, one that will simply end the life of your sideline. The game continued a few moves, but the fight was basically over already here.
   
     Another really surprising game was the one won by the Greek GM- Mastrovasilis Dimitrios vs GM Andrei Volokitin- a well known Ukrainian GM who is known to have a deep knowledge in all kind of Sicilians along with a very sharp style of playing. It seems that he either forgot or was unaware of a nice opening trick:

White to move

     At the first glance- it seems that white is in trouble, his knight on "c3" being pinned and the bishop on "b5" seemingly unstable as well. The move that followed solves all white's issues and even puts black in some serious trouble. 7.Rb1! - there are already a few games played in this position with white having an almost 100% score. This "mysterious" move is meant to protect the bishop on "b5" after an eventual capture on "c3". A really aesthetic move! 7...a6 8. Bxd7- Bxd7 9. 0-0 - Nxc3 10. bxc3- e6 11. d5!

Black to move

     White has a decisive attack, which the Greek GM successfully converted into a full point a few moves later.

     I guess it is enough with illustrating opening disasters... My point is that even at the top boards of the ECC, which implies top GMs such things are possible. Remembering some of my recent upsets from the EIWCC, I feel it's not only "women who make these kind of mistakes".

     As about the Romanian players, GM Constantin Lupulescu played a book-like game until the very last moves where, being in time trouble he missed some nice tactics which would win the game immediately, giving away the whole advantage some moves later and having to settle with a draw...

White to move

          White could play  57. Nc6! here, the point is that after 57... bxc6 58. dxc6- black's bishop can not go away because of 59. Rxh7 followed by 60.c7 +-

          Instead, white played 57. Ke2- fxe4 53. Qxe4? (it was important to give an inttermediate check- 54.Rg1+! first, only after that capturing on "e4" with a winning position) 53...Rg7!. Objectively, black is still worse, but being in time trouble, white's king already feels endangered and it's not that easy to understand how is the position after 54. Nxb7, which is engine's first choice.

          White played 54. Kd2? instead- giving away the whole advantage. A draw was agreed because after 54... Qg5+, followed by 55...Qxh5 black is already not worse.

           A big miss for our player who could have made it to +3 if winning this game.

      If we can say he was unlucky, the Romanian IM Mihnea Costachi definitely had Caissa on his side, with his opponent- GM Daniele Vocaturo- blundering a whole exchange in a better position.

Black to play

IM Mihnea Costachi

      The opening stage did not go that well for white, thus black has a pawn up on "c7". After an eventual 22...Re7, protecting it, black is still better, white would have some compensation for the pawn, but it would have to be proved if that was enough. Instead, black played 22...c5, blundering  23. Nb6 which left him an exchange down. Our player played precisely to convert his material advantage into a full point.

     GM Bogdan Deac  won in nice style vs his lower rated opponent, climbing to a solid +2 as well. GM Mircea Parligras has had a slow start, drawing all his games.

     IM Vladimir Hamitevici of Moldova won a nice game with black vs the Russian GM Boris Savchenko. It was a very intstructive game played in the Advance Variation of the Caro-Kann Defence:

Black to move

     In this double-edged position, it seems to me that black is faster in his attack 12...f6! 13. exf6- Ng6 14. c4- Nxf6 15. Rc1- g4, with a dangerous attack with which white was unable to cope.

     GM Dmitry Svetushkin blundered in a totally winning position, having to settle for a draw and remaining on +1.

     Concluding, R IV of the EICC in Minsk was a very interesting one to follow, with many things to learn. 

     I wish all our players the best of luck for the 5th round and to give their best before tomorrow's free day!

EICC in Minsk

     The European Individual Chess Championship is in progress these days in Minsk.

GM Constantin Lupulescu

     At some point, I considered participating myself, but my schedule will be very tight this summer and I thought such a serious tournament would take too much energy and preparation. Otherwise, this has been my favorite tournament to play for some years in a row, as it is the strongest Open in Europe and a player like me never gets to play vs such strong opponents in every round.
     Romania is represented by GM Constantin Lupulescu (2/2p), GM Bogdan Deac (1,5/2p) , GM Mircea Parligras (1p/2) and IM Mihnea Costachi (1p/2).
     The toughest battles are still ahead....
   
     I liked yesterday's game of GM Lupulescu vs IM Moskalenko, as it was a perfect demonstration of  how the pair of bishops dominates the board! You can see it yourself in the diagrams below:

Black to move

     Black decided to take 18...Bxc3, giving  white the advantage of having the pair of bishops. While I can understand that something went wrong for black in the opening stage and the positions is already unpleasant, I believe that this move is definitely not the way to continue the fight.
   

White to move

      White is clearly better and goes on in creating another weakness in black's position 33.h5, followed by 34. h6. While it's not engine's first choice, for the human understanding it looks like the most logical way to make the advantage decisive.

GM Dmitry Svetushkin

     GM Dimtry Svetushkin of Moldova also played a high quality game to make a draw with black vs the N.3 favorite of the tournament- GM Dmitry Jakovenko. It was a Spanish, Anti-Marshall System, where black solved all his opening problems and I think was even somewhat better in the final position, where the draw was agreed. You can judge yourself:

White to move

     Black has just played 11... Nd8!- following his idea which began with his 10th move - Qd7, to play "c5" and then to prepare slowly "d5", taking control in the center. He illustrated it perfectly in the game:

Black to move

     This is the position where the draw was agreed. Black has achieved all of his goals, taking control in the center, getting some space advantage and placing all of his pieces harmoniously. I guess that the endgame after the queen exchange should be more pleasant for black to play.

Here are the pairings for today's round: R3 

   
     I wish all the Romanian and Moldavian players participating good luck in today's 3rd Round and I hope to see some interesting fights!

King's Tournament

     A very eventful day is behind!
     The first round of the match has proven to be very interesting, though a bit unlucky for the Romanian team, but I'll get to this part a bit later.
     The organization has really impressed me- a very nice playing hall, a big screen with the live games, commentator's room (you can follow the live commentary on playchess) with press-conferences with the players, great snacks, tea,coffee (tasted and approved by me :D ). I envy a little bit the players.
     I tried to do a new thing, I made some notes with my thoughts about the games, which I wrote while kibitzing them. Here they are:

     Game nr. 1: Lu Shanglei- Lupulescu Constantin

     Opening: Vey solid preparation by both players. It looks like both players have analysed everything until the very drawish rook endgame.


      Game nr. 2: Nevednichy Vladislav- Wei Yi

      Opening: Black looks confident in a Rossolimo with 4...bc. The players had the same varioation in the yesterday's blitz game. It looks to me that black has solved his opening problems. Wei Yi used to play Najdorf and Dragon before, I guess that 2...Nc6 is special preparation for today's game.

      Middlegame: The opening battle is clearly won by the young Wei Yi, black has a 50 minutes time advantage, as well as a better position. It looks like the knight on "e5"is very unstable and it is more of a target than a well-placed piece. Black's got the pair of bishops and unless white will be able to take control of the vital black squares "e5" and "c5", the threat of a potential dynamic center along with the pair of bishops might become difficult to fight against.

     Game nr. 3:  Wang Yue- Jianu Vlad

     Opening: Black has got an interesting position after the opening. His main idea is to apply pressure on the white's advanced center pawns, speculating ideas with "b5" and "e6", exploiting the position of his knight on "a5" and the bishop on "g7". Looks like an interesting battle is ahead.

     Middlegame: I think that this position was not specifically prepared for today by any of the players. Black took a very debatable decision with his 12th move "bxc4", defining the pawn structure. The main continuations were "e6", "e5" and "Bh6". I think that this decision has limited greatly his chances of creating counter play  and the knight on "a5" has become a miss-placed piece. It looks like will have to solve some serious problems in this game.

     Game nr. 4: Parligras Mircea- Ni Hua

     Opening: It looks like white applies a bit of pressure. More time and a better piece coordination might be some of the premises of a slight advantage.

     Endgame: A very pleasant endgame for white has arisen. Mircea has got a big time advantage as well, though it might be not that significant on this stage of the game. It looks like black will have to solve some problems in his way of seeking equalization.

      Here are the final results:

Bo.	1	China	Rtg	-	2	Romania	Rtg	3 : 1
1.1	GM	Lu, Shanglei	2566	-	GM	Lupulescu, Constantin	2643	½ - ½
1.2	GM	Wei, Yi	2649	-	GM	Nevednichy, Vladislav	2563	1 - 0
1.3	GM	Wang, Yue	2711	-	GM	Jianu, Vlad-Cristian	2588	1 - 0
1.4	GM	Ni, Hua	2677	-	GM	Parligras, Mircea-Emilian	2594	½ - ½

     Here you can see some photos I took:

     Will keep you posted!


xoxo from Medias ;)

Chinese Wall vs Romanian Stake

     I am very happy to announce that an exquisite event will take place in Romania very soon, starting on the 22nd of November!
     The traditional "King's Tournament" came with a new format- a 4 games match between the best Romanian and Chinese players. The last ones happen to be the reigning Olympic Champions! The match will be foregone by a blitz tournament, where in addition to the 8 GMs our most promising juniors- IM Deac Bogdan (2385) and FM Costachi Mihnea (2382) will compete .
     It is going to be a very interesting match to follow and I am happy that I will be able to do it live! The Chinese team is no doubt very strong and a bit younger, with the reigning World Junior Champion in the team composition- GM Lu Shanglei (2566).

GM Lu Shanglei

     The other 3 players are in the composition of the Olympic Golden Team- Wang Yue (2711), Ni Hua (2677) and Wei Yi (2649).

GM Ni Hua

GM Wang Yue

GM Wei Yi

     The "Romanian Stake" will be represented by: GM Constantin Lupulescu (2643) who constanly qualifies for World Cup and shows fantastic results at the European Championships, GM Mircea Parligras (2594), GM Vlad Jianu (2588) and GM Vladislav Nevednichy (2563).

GM Constantin Lupulescu

GM Mircea Parligras

GM Vlad Jianu

GM Vladislav Nevednichy

     The event will take place in Medias- a very rustic Romanian city, as you can see bellow:

     I will be more than happy to deliver impressions as well as reports from the place of the event and let the best team win!



xoxo from the board of the "Romanian Stake" team ;)

The Game

     It's been a very interesting month for me, one in which I had some very good time doing the things I like the most.

With a dear friend- Katerina Pavlidou

     The Europeans ended for me not as well as it had started. If I had a 2600+ performance after the first five rounds and a high level of chess, the tournament ended with me showing a 2440 performance and only one truly good game out of the last 6. If to consider that it was the first tournament of the year for me, after a two and a half months break, the result is normal, one that I hope to be followed by better ones :)

     As about Armenia, I enjoyed it and I am grateful for the nice people I have met there and for the friends I've made :)

     Aaah, not to forget to mention, if you remember, I was telling how much I liked the Armenian food in the last post... Well, I guess I liked it too much, as I got a very nasty food poisoning in the last days- maybe that's the reason why I started winning again :))) (I suppose it is a joke, well, the last part, the food poisoning wasn't any of a joke :P )

     I've drawn all the necessary conclusions and I am ready to play the next tournaments (or I will be in about 10 days :)

Constantin Lupulescu

     The last but not the least important thing about the tournament- Constantin Lupulescu shared the 2nd place with an impressive 2759 performance and has qualified for the 2015 World Cup, with which I congratulate him once again! 2/2 in the last two games, both with black, against higher rated players, both in French- hm... maybe I should rethink my opening repertoire ;)

     Now, about next tournaments- I will play the "Karpos Open",which will be held  in Macedonia, from the 29th of March. It is going to be a very strong tournament, I am nr.82 so far in the starting ranking list, which you can check here: http://chess-results.com/tnr121297.aspx?lan=11

     I will play another three tournaments after that, about which I'll keep you posted ( of course :D )!

     That's it so far, I have so much to write about, but let's keep the intrigue until the next posts ;)

     An idea to keep your mind busy- "Do you think your personal karma affects your level of chess?"

xoxo from Iasi ;)

Good Day

     There it is- a half of the Europeans has already passed.
     It is as I expected, a very difficult, but in the same time a very challenging and interesting tournament. I've played against strong opponents, I learned new things and I've fighted in every game until the very end. I am satisfied with my chess so far- well, it's impossible to be 100% satisfied, but I understand that there's a reason I'm still an IM and not a GM- there is place for improvement.
     We had a free day today and as a "real professional" I went to an excursion through the holly places of Yerevan. I had some very good time and I learned many new things about christianity and about the Armenian history.
     Another thing I can't help mentioning is the Armenian food- it is so tasty that I think I will try to learn how to cook some of their dishes- especially their traditional soup "Spas". I eat it at least once a day :D
     I hope that the second part of the tournament will go at least as well as the first one :)
     The other Romanians keep their chances for qualification, with Constantin Lupulescu and Mircea Parligras having the best score among us- "+2".

46	GM	Lupulescu Constantin	2643	ROU	1	1	½	½	½	½	4.0	42	2670	10	2.50	Official results
74	GM	Nevednichy Vladislav	2591	ROU	½	0	1	0	½	1	3.0	158	2308	10	-20.00	Official results
85	GM	Jianu Vlad-Cristian	2574	ROU	1	½	0	1	½	½	3.5	87	2515	10	-2.90	Official results
88	GM	Parligras Mircea-Emilian	2572	ROU	1	0	1	0	1	1	4.0	67	2529	10	-2.20	Official results
166	IM	Bulmaga Irina	2375	ROU	½	1	0	½	½	0	2.5	161	2547	10	12.10	Official results
187	FM	Deac Bogdan-Daniel	2322	ROU	0	1	½	0	½	0	2.0	202	2324	15	0.30	Official results
251		Porfireanu Serban	1903	ROU	0	0	0	0	0	1	1.0	255	1337	15	-18.30	Official results

     Here are some photos from the last days:

You can find more photos on the tournament's site: http://eicc2014.am/gallery

With Maria Gevorgyan and Katerina Pavlidou ;)

xoxo from Yerevan! ;)