At the double-round robin tourney in Biel, Carlsen leads with 2 wins and a draw, followed by Morozevich who has a win and 2 draws. Shirov is third while Vachier Lagrave, Caruana and Pelletier share 4th-6th places.
In Beijing, after four rounds, Armenia is in the lead followed by China and Azerbaijan. Russia is 4th, Hungary and Ukraine are 5th-6th, Israel is 7th, India and USA are 8th-9th while Egypt is 10th and last. With the exception of Egypt, which qualified as Africa’s representative, all the teams are very strong so the final outcome is still anybody’s guess. Stay tuned.
Games of the week. Here’s the world’s number one in an easy win against a veteran warrior. Mark Crowther’s notes.
White: M. Carlsen (2815)
Black: A. Shirov (2714)
QGD Semi-Slav
Biel 2011
1.Nf3 d5 2.d4 Nf6 3.c4 c6 4.Nc3 e6 5.e3 Nbd7 6.Bd3 dxc4 7.Bxc4 b5 8.Bd3 Bb7 9.0-0 a6 10.e4 c5 11.d5 c4 12.Bc2 Qc7 13.Nd4 e5 14.Nf5 g6 15.Nh6 A first new move but one that Fritz 12 at least thinks is the best. Carlsen played much faster than Shirov and at no point did black’s position look satisfactory so it is odd he played this line. 15.Ne3 with an eventual draw was Anand,V (2786)-Van Wely,L (2679)/Monte Carlo MNC 2005 and indeed this does look fine for black almost immediately. 15…Nh5 16.g3 Bc5 17.Qf3 Rf8 18.Bd2 Bd4 19.b4 cxb3 20.Bxb3 Qd6 21.Rac1 Ng7 22.a4 f5 23.axb5 f4 24.Ne2 Bb6 25.bxa6 Bxa6 26.Bc4 g5 27.Bxa6 Rxa6 28.Rc8+ Bd8 29.Nf5 Nxf5 30.exf5 Nf6 31.Qd3 Ra7 32.Qb5+ Qd7 33.Rxd8+ and 1-0.
Now here’s one of the games from Azerbaijan’s 3-1 trouncing of India in the second round at the world team tourney. IM Malcolm Pein annotates.
White: S. Mamedyarov (2765)
Black: S. Ganguly (2627)
Nimzo Indian
Bd. 3 World Team Ch Beijing 2011
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Qc2 0-0 5.e4 d5 (5…Bxc3+ 6.bxc3 d6) 6.e5 Ne4 7.Bd3 c5 8.Nf3 cxd4 9.Nxd4 Nd7 10.Bf4 Ndc5 11.0-0 Nxd3 12.Qxd3 Bxc3 13.bxc3 b6 (White’s pawns are damaged but he is ahead in development) 14.cxd5 Qxd5 15.Rfd1 Bb7 16.c4 Qa5 17.f3 Nc5 18.Qe3 Qa4 19.Bg5! Qxc4 20.Ne2 Ba6 21.Nf4 Rac8 22.Rd4! Qc2 23.Nh5 (White dominates the kingside dark squares) 23…Qe2 (23…Nd3 24.h3!) 24.Qxe2 Bxe2 25.Be7 f5? (25…Rfe8 26.Nf6+! gxf6 27.Rg4+ Kh8 28.Bxf6#; 25…Rfe8 26.Nf6+! Kh8 27.Nxe8 Rxe8; 25…h6 loses the exchange but resists) 26.exf6 Rf7 27.Nxg7 and 1-0.
Puzzler.
White: Ka5, Nb5, Qc1, Bd3, pawn on d4
Black: Kd5, Ne5, pawns on a6 and f3
White to play and mate in three moves.
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