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Dark Knight / Le Chevalier Noir
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The Nakamura - Giri draw appears to be their 11th consecutive draw and 15th in 19 classical encounters. That's starting to get into Anand - Kramnik territory who have a lifetime draw rate between each other of 80.23% (69/86) heading into today's game ):
I'm asking you, not because I need your infinite wisdom, but because you seem to think there is some kind of universal 'real' chess out there. Like everything else, though, when pressed to define it, you run away with your tail between your legs. You see, that's the risk you take in engaging in debate 'for sport' as you put it to Olivier Tessier: if you are constantly taking a position, and then prove unable or unwilling to defend it, no one is going to listen to you. And when you do try and defend it, your logic rises up to beat you on the head, as proven by your inconsistent stand on whether definition of a blunder should be based on long computer analysis or not.
"No, a blunder should be obvious enough without any long analysis.... but when Karjakin, Svidler, Kramnik and Caruana all call a move a blunder without long analysis, they are wrong, and I can (cough, cough) prove it with some long computer analysis."
I do have an answer for you as to what is a good game of chess.... but you're not going to like it....
like so many other things in life, and as you would learn if you had ever analyzed a poker hand.....
IT DEPENDS.
And here we go again, you are making up a quote, apparently from me. But you modified it so that it's now telling things I haven't said.
On any self-respectable forum, you'd get an infraction. It's usually against the forum rules to make up quotes in order to dismiss someone's argument. But around here, I doubt moderation is sufficient to enforce that.
And here we go again, you are making up a quote, apparently from me. But you modified it so that it's now telling things I haven't said.
On any self-respectable forum, you'd get an infraction. It's usually against the forum rules to make up quotes in order to dismiss someone's argument. But around here, I doubt moderation is sufficient to enforce that.
And that's usually where I leave...
Cheers,
LOL... it's fun to watch you eat your own words. Even though you now say "it's now telling things I haven't said" that is only true in the sense that you didn't say it all in one go. But anyone with any reading ability can see over 2 or 3 of your posts, that is exactly what you meant. I could have added I was paraphrasing, but that would confuse you even more.
Welcome to the 'real' world, kiddo. This ain't your grandma's chess forum. Maybe things will change here someday, but until then, you spit out shit, it can come right back at you.
Good riddance, and I'd stay away from blitz tournaments if I were you... not 'real' chess by your standards. I'm sure Wayne Komer will still post blitz games in full even though you don't consider them 'good' games.
Only the rushing is heard...
Onward flies the bird.
Players must make 40 moves in 1 hour 40 minutes, then all remaining moves in 50 minutes, with a 30 second increment throughout. 'Football' scoring will use used, with 3 points awarded for a win and 1 point for a draw. The Sofia-Corsica rules apply, so there will be no agreed draws without consent of the Chief Arbiter.
Nigel Short joins Lawrence Trent for the last part of the commentary. With his beard and a scarf knotted around his neck, Lawrence is looking like an Afghan warrior in a blazer.
London Chess Classic 2014
Round 1, Dec. 10
Adams, Michael – Caruana, Fabiano
C90 Ruy Lopez, Closed, Pilnik Variation
Black had the better position, was winning and then played 27…c4. White then was winning and then played 34. Nh4. Both players just had a minute or so to make ten moves to the time limit. Fabiano emerges slightly better.
White thinks for 12 minutes and plays 43. Qd7 which apparently wins the game, which still goes on to move 73.
_________
Earlier Nigel talked a bit about William Lombardy, whom he played in 1973 on an island group off of Iceland, when the volcanic island was threatening to erupt.
Nigel interviewed Ken Rogoff this morning. He was a professional chess player, which career he abandoned for the World Bank. He was in the top 40 of World Chess. It was an interview for The Financial Times but has not been written up yet.
Daniel King came in and the three guys analyzed up and down as the game ploughed on with queens and pawns.
Malcolm Pein replaced Short and mentioned that in the first year of the London Classic, the Olympia people had no experience with how long chess games went and he assured them games rarely went beyond one hundred moves. “We’ll be out by 10:30 latest”, he said. In the first tournament McShane-Short went 163 moves and the officials, security people etc were all ready to kill him.
The game Kramnik-Anand has all been seen on computers before:
Giri on Kramnik-Anand: "It looks exciting, but this particular game probably happened in 50 computer games"
Short on Kramnik-Anand: "Why did they stop there, just when it was livening up. I think there were only six games from this position."
Nakamura-Giri was a draw and with the Adams win, Mickey is leading the tournament after the first round.
__________
There are mixed opinions about the value of blitz chess. Still, there is a first-class writeup of the recent blitz tournament by Colin McGourty at
Why is Fabiano Caruana, the world’s second best classical player and perhaps even the world’s best rapid player (1.4 points ahead of Carlsen on the live rating lists), so poor* at blitz?
* by poor we mean 2679 and world no. 71, though of course such a level is beyond the dreams of most of us.
Frankly, your guess is as good as ours, but here are at least a few hypotheses:
His style is based more on deep calculation than intuition and he simply doesn’t have the time to calculate properly at blitz pace.
He lacks practice – perhaps he’s played less than his peers and doesn’t, for instance, play much on the internet!?
He has some kind of mental block due to his previous bad results and it’s become a vicious circle?!
Yes, we agree, it’s not convincing! It’s clearly an issue, though, since many events and even, potentially, World Championships can be decided at blitz.
A burst of applause for Vladimir at the start of the press conference. He is asked why there aren’t more King’s Indians played in tournament practice today. Having won this handily, Vladimir says, “I am asking my opponents that same question!” He seems very happy as did Anand when he was questioned earlier. Like Korchnoi, Vlad thinks the KI is unsound. White has the centre without a fight. He says you need to be young, have a lot of energy and have lots of ideas to play the King’s Indian. Now he prefers it as White.
- Kramnik has been playing the computer’s first choice for the last dozen moves. the man IS a beast of chess
- Congrats to Kramnik - a fantastic win with a beautiful finish! What a pleasure to watch!
London Chess Classic
Round 2, Dec. 11
Giri, Anish – Adams, Michael
E01 Catalan, Closed
In yesterday’s commentary I quoted a game Lombardy-Short. I have found it at Vestmannaeyjum 1985, a French, which was drawn. For collectors, there is actually a tournament book: International Chess Tournament Vestmannaeyjum 29 May - 11 June 1985. 13 bulletins from the tournament. All games in figurine notation. Result tables. Lots of photos! 1) Lein 9½/13; 2-3) Hjartarson & H. Ólafsson 9; 4) Short 8½. 103 pp A4 hardbound in black leatherette with gold print. Condition VG. Weight 636 g. Sold at auction for about 25 pounds this year.
______
There were comments about Kramnik-Anand, which made it seem that there were many games precedent, not OTB but “on computer”.
Here is what John Saunders, Press Officer has to say in the official account of Round 1:
“Next to finish was the battle between the two former world champions, Vladimir Kramnik and Vishy Anand. This started life as a Semi-Slav, Botvinnik System, which to the uninitiated looks like the hairiest sort of opening variation imaginable. But it has been analysed, almost to destruction, over several decades, and now grandmasters are prone to playing through whopping slabs of theory from memory. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it demo’ed using the Hiarcs Chess Explorer software in the VIP Room. Hiarcs Chess Explorer is a great piece of software and you can get a comprehensive opening book to go with it containing gazillions of games. Some of the lines being examined by Julian Hodgson went beyond move 40 and yet the Hiarcs software was still showing precedents from other games. Imagine that: having to go beyond move 40 to get ‘out of the book’. It’s not too much of an exaggeration to say that you could go straight from ‘the book’ to a six-piece endgame tablebase in one or two of these lines.
Nigel Short was scathing about this sort of opening play, in the commentary room, particularly when Dan King said something about this sort of variation being primarily for correspondence players (apologies if I’ve misquoted you, Dan). “Correspondence players,” opined Nigel, “should be executed.” Which, later in the VIP room, led into a thoroughly unwholesome debate (in which I confess I took part, a tad too enthusiastically) as to the most suitable form of execution for those who use the medium of the Royal Mail (or their own country’s postal service) to play chess. Rising to Nigel’s challenge, I thought something slow was most appropriate, while another GM, not normally known for sadism, thought they ought to be immured. But the latter seems somehow more appropriate for people who play the Berlin Wall, OTB as well as via the post.
Incidentally, before anyone emails me, I don’t really subscribe to any of the above. I have my excuse ready (one which I seem to remember deploying before, back in the mists of time): bigger boys made me do it.”
Nigel and Daniel talk about the attractions of the Berlin with Giri and Caruana. Anish says in the Berlin you always have playable positions as Black.
Fabiano says as White you cannot avoid it. It is very forcing. It takes the game into predictable lines, there are very few sidelines. The theory is getting more and more worked out.
Giri says that the Evans is better than the King’s Gambit. Nigel says that in the 1990s he had a discussion with Vladimir Kramnik about the e4 openings. He said, “The Evans Gambit, I understand that. It’s logical. You give up a wing pawn and get some tempi. But I don’t understand the King’s Gambit. You lose a pawn and weaken your king’s side.”
Fabiano says that correspondence players have been working on the King’s Gambit and it could be interesting to play OTB again.
Round Three
December 12, 2014
Adams, Michael – Kramnik, Vladimir
C67 Ruy Lopez, Berlin Defence, Open Variation
- Engines are screaming that 40.f6 was completely winning in Adams-Kramnik, but Adams played 40.c5 instead
With all these Berlins, jokingly, Lawrence says to Macauley Peterson that one improvement to the game might be if you are given a window of a couple of minutes on your own time to verbally abuse your opponent during the game. You can’t use swear words or be too abusive. Trash talk – three opportunities during the game.
Round Three
December 12, 2014
Nakamura, Hikaru – Anand, Vishy
C52 Evan’s Gambit, Tarkakover Attack
Everybody seems happy to have seen an Evan’s Gambit, especially since the other two games were Berlins.
Nigel says that Captain Evans discovered the gambit on his boat, which was between the island of Anglesey and Dublin in the 1820s and it became the most feared attacking opening of the 19th century.
Fabiano says that correspondence players have been working on the King’s Gambit and it could be interesting to play OTB again.
I played a lot of King's Gambit games in correspondence chess. Even after computers started to get good I'd still get nice games. After the computers got very strong it was pointless to play that opening. All I'd get is a game a pawn down. The computers seemed to kill the play in the positions. If there are now lines which are playable against computers I'll have to see what I think.
Here's one I liked. Jan liked gambits and we played several times.
I think one of the highlights of this tournament for me is watching the post-game interviews with Kramnik. That guy spouts out lines and variations like a machine.
(Mark Crowther) - Hikaru Nakamura beat Michael Adams in round 4 of the London Chess Classic to move within striking distance of the leaders Anish Giri and Vladimir Kramnik who meet in the final round.
Nakamura played a slightly unusual move order in the Queen's Gambit delaying the development of his Queen's Knight and playing Qc2 instead. Adams could have taken play back into normal lines if he had played 7...0-0 but instead his 7...c5 got him into trouble that he never really escaped from. Adams retained drawing chances although after 24...Ne6 allowed 25.Nxe6 fe breaking his kingside pawn structure there was some argument as to whether the rook ending was now theoretically lost among some of the players. After 28.Rb1 Adams' task in the double rook ending looked hard and Nakamura trapped his rook on move 40.
Viswanathan Anand looked to have some kind of edge against Anish Giri but a miscalculation meant that the position turned round to being slightly better for black. Anand however quickly simplified to a draw.
Vladimir Kramnik looked to have nagging pressure against Fabiano Caruana's Gruenfeld but a finely calculated combination liquidating the centre and most of the pieces led to a draw for Caruana.
- A very clean game start to finish from Nakamura. Good preparation and then good moves at critical points. Qb4+ was nice, later Qc7 was inspired. The decision to exchange Qs on d7 and the decision to push g4 to lock down the h5 square were all very classy. Flawless game as I have seen from him in a long time.
- The move quality graph shows white never made an error and played all top engine moves or second choice moves where the difference was extremely slight and probably just engine noise. By my engine and the one on chess 24 as well as the engine on chessbomb.com it was a perfect game from White's end.
Adams only mistakes came in the endgame and perhaps the early c5 can be considered dubious but it is theory.
- This may have been Nakamura's most perfect game start to finish in his career. There is literally nothing he could have done better. Opening edge, flawless middlegame and perfect endgame technique. A complete game domination and Adam played well too but Nakamura was just better the whole game and the advantage grew move after move.
- Adams basically lost a drawn endgame but you can't take anything away from Nakamura. He is sharp and relentless.
“Viswanathan Anand has won the 2014 London Chess Classic after a final-round win with the black pieces over Michael Adams gave him the tiebreaker edge over Vladimir Kramnik and Anish Giri, who drew their game. Fabiano Caruana came close to joining all the other participants in posting a single win in London, but had to accept a draw against Hikaru Nakamura after six hours and 81 moves. You could almost hear the collective groan around the chess world when the last round began with Hikaru Nakamura and Vishy Anand both playing the Berlin Defence with Black, while the leaders, Anish Giri and Vladimir Kramnik, blitzed out twenty moves of theory.
We needn’t have worried, though, as all three games developed into thrilling battles that kept us on the edge of our seats. It was helped by the remarkable fact that five of the six players had a very real chance of finishing first.”
And on Caruana-Nakamura:
“Nakamura couldn’t complain about the position he got, though, and with his 30…g5! pawn sac he really set the cat among the pigeons.
Short on time, Caruana now had to find a very narrow path to safety, which he managed with a fine exchange sacrifice (replay the game here). In the end it was Caruana who had any winning chances, but the best it seems he could have hoped for was to force Rook + Bishop vs. Rook, which might have extended the game even further than the six hours it took, but was unlikely to alter the outcome.
Afterwards both players were critical of their play, with Nakamura indulging in a little hyperbole:
The problem is I went completely insane. I thought I was just mating.
Caruana, in turn, was worried that he’d missed a win in the ending, but a quick computer check of their play suggests another version of events – it was a well-played and interesting game by both players!
Caruana repeated his assessment from the day before that it was hard to mount a comeback after losing in the first round of an event lasting only five rounds.”
Online Comments
- The length of this tournament leaves much to be desired. I'm not opposed to rapid and blitz "preludes" to classical events, but I do dislike them when they lead to ridiculously short tournaments like this one.
- I have the greatest respect and admiration for Anand, but lets not get carried away. He had 1 win and four draws in a five round tournament and basically tied for first with two other players.
Short: "There were some inner groans when the Berlin was played"
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