This star-studded round robin tournament, the year’s strongest, started on Nov. 7 and ends on the 19th. It’s a category 21 event whose average Elo is 2764. There are 10 players and time controls are 40 moves in two hours, then 20 moves in one hour and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game with 30 seconds increment per move in this phase.
The rest of the lineup are world champ Vishy Anand of India, world’s number two Magnus Carlsen of Norway, Levon Aronian of Armenia, Boris Gelfand of Israel, Peter Leko of Hungary, Ukrainians Vassily Ivanchuk and Ruslan Ponomariov, and Russian stars Peter Svidler and Alexander Morozevich. World’s number 1 Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria is the only member of the elite not playing.
Young Carlsen was expected to do well, but the kid has been reported sick. A doctor put him on antibiotics. So far, he has drawn all his games.
Kramnik, in contrast, has won three and split the point in the other three rounds. He’s half-a-point ahead of Anand.
Game of the week.
Kramnik was the only player to score a win in round four, and against former Russian champ Svidler no less. Svidler essayed the Gruenfeld against Kramnik, who defeated Kasparov in the same opening in game 2 of their match in London in 2000. As our annotator IM Malcolm Pein noted, Kasparov did not dare to repeat the Gruenfeld again. Their game went 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.cxd5 Nxd5 5.e4 Nxc3 6.bxc3 Bg7 7.Nf3 c5 8.Be3 Qa5 9.Qd2 Bg4 10.Rb1, which, Pein said, was a new move.
White: V. Kramnik (2772)
Black: P. Svidler (2754)
Tal Memorial, Moscow 2009
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.cxd5 Nxd5 5.e4 Nxc3 6.bxc3 Bg7 7.Be3 c5 8.Rc1 (Karpov’s idea, White delays Nf3 to avoid Bg4) 8…Qa5 9.Qd2 0-0 (9…Nc6 10.d5 Ne5 11.Be2 and White prepares f2-f4 and c3-c4) 10.Nf3 Bg4 (10…cxd4 11.cxd4 Qxd2+ is the main alternative seen in Kramnik-Svidler 2004) 11.d5! Na6 (The knight is poorly placed here. If 11…Bxf3 12.gxf3 Nd7 13.c4; perhaps 11…Nd7!? 12.c4 [12.Ng5 Nf6]] 12…Qa3) 12.h4! (It was Karpov who demonstrated that White can attack in these positions) 12…f5 (12…c4 13.Bh6 Nc5 14.Bxg7 Kxg7 15.Ne5!) 13.exf5 Bxf5 14.h5 Rad8 15.hxg6 Bxg6 16.Bh6! (Just ignoring Black’s counters) 16…Bxh6 17.Rxh6 Rf6 18.Ne5 Qa4 19.Qe3! Qf4 (Losing a pawn but Black is in trouble 19…Nb4 20.Nxg6 Rxg6 21.Rxg6+ hxg6 22.Qe4 wins; 19…Nb4 20.cxb4 Qxb4+ 21.Qc3 Qf4; 19…Qe8 20.Nxg6 Rxg6 21.Rxg6+ Qxg6 22.Bc4) 20.Qxf4 Rxf4 21.Nxg6 hxg6 22.Rxg6+ Kf7 23.Rg5 Re4+ 24.Be2 Kf6 25.Rh5 Kg6 26.g4 Rf8 27.Rd1 Rf6 28.Rh8 Kg7 29.Rd8 Rb6 30.f3 Re3 31.Rd3 Re5 32.Kf2 Rh6 (32…Rb2 33.Re3) 33.Bf1 Rh2+ 34.Kg3 Rxa2 35.d6 exd6 36.R3xd6 Re7 37.R6d7 and 1-0 in view of 37.R6d7 Rxd7 38.Rxd7+ Kf6 39.Rxb7.
Puzzler.
White — Ka4, Ba6, Nb8, Nc6, Qc1, pawns on e3 and h4
Black — Kd5, Nd6, Rf7, Bh7, Rh3, pawns on b3, c4, c7, d4, e6 and f3
White to play and mate in four.
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