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Re: Candidates 2016, Moacow
Candidates 2016, Moscow
March 15. 2016
Round Four
Alexandra and Evgeny are the commentators as usual. Egor Piskunov is fielding questions from the viewers.
An hour or so into the broadcast, Daniil Dubov replaces Evgeny for a while. He is the 19-year-old Russian who got his grandmaster title at the age of 14 years, 11 months. He has the lugubrious look of a young Steve Buscemi.
There is an electronic count-down clock, which is unofficial. One knows that there is zero-tolerance if a player is not at the board at the start but the Arbiter would make the final decision before forfeiting the late player.
Egor shows some of the security features – notably a bank of lockerettes for people to put their cell phones in so they don’t take them into the playing hall. Each visitor is scanned with a portable electronic wand by the security guard.
The wallpaper has white objects on a black background. The white things look ever so much like magnified images of diatoms, if you can cast your mind back to Biology 101.
One viewer’s question was interesting:
Which chess match has impressed you the most?
My generation would instantly reply Fischer-Spassky, 1972. But that is old hat now.
Alexandra replies that for her it was the games of Karpov-Kasparov, Moscow 1984. After 5 months and 48 games, the match was abandoned in controversial circumstances with Karpov leading five wins to three (with 40 draws), and replayed in the World Chess Championship 1985. She talked to Karpov about it, sympathizing with the pressure of world attention, the same opponent and playing month after month.
For Evgeny, the match that impressed him was the playoff between Peter Svidler and Sergey Karjakin in the Baku World Cup of October, 2015. There was a total of ten games – four regular, four rapid and two blitz – all wins or losses and no draws, with Sergey finally winning by 6-4.
Egor gives a question as to whether Karjakin is playing “street chess” in this tournament?
The commentators are at a loss. Is “street chess” the rough and tumble coffee house chess or down and dirty chess where no rules apply? Sorry, no answer here.
There is a filmed interview with Kramnik where he wholly supports the rights of the organizers to do what they want with their broadcast and coverage. He adds that has all been legally approved. I will say nothing critical about this here because I fear that letter from Shekhovtsov & Partners.
The two quiz question to ponder over (with answers given at the end of this post) are:
1) All the participants in this tournament are grandmasters. When was the GM title first awarded by FIDE and how many of them were there at that time?
2) In the Karpov-Kasparov matches how many games were played in total and what was their final score against each other?
Alexandra is asked if she will try for the world title again. She became Women’s World Chess Champion in 2008 by beating Hou Yifan in the final. Alexandra says that she needs the motivation for that goal and at the moment she is not so ambitious.
The first game to finish is Nakamura – Giri. It was a Semi-Slav which they both had analyzed very deeply and although Giri’s king was flushed out into the open, there was no way to make progress and Nakamura forced a perpetual.
Svidler-Aronian was a slightly odd English opening which produced a small edge for Svidler but Levon Aronian found the moves to escape any long-term problems, though he was temporarily down a pawn. In the end, the players agreed to a draw in a rook-and-pawn endgame where no one could make any progress.
The description of the one win this round on the Official Site: A strange opening by Karjakin, who had White against Anand. While Anand struggled to find a concrete plan, Karjakin was able to saddle Anand with hanging pawns on the c and d files. Anand eventually advanced one of them, which was traded off, but that left the other one very weak and with Anand having to play passive defense. Such a position is ideal for Karjakin, whose technical skills are second to none and he slowly ground Anand down. Anand resigned as Karjakin was about to win a pawn and be able to force a trade of all remaining pieces, leaving with an easily won king-and-pawn ending.
And Sagar Shah on Caruana-Topalov:
It was a refreshing change in the opening as Caruana, instead of going for the Ruy Lopez, played the Guioco Piano as White. Both the players handled the opening phase of the game quite well and the position was relatively balanced. In the middle game Caruana shut the centre with the move d4-d5 and the game became quite sharp. Fabiano’s play was attached with queenside play while Veselin tried to create inroads in the kingside with f5 break. In mutual time trouble Topalov went completely wrong and simply blundered. It was such a winning position for the American that a full point for him was a foregone conclusion. However, Caruana blundered, and surprisingly it was the 41st move! The win was no longer apparent and in the rook endgame the game was simply drawn. A heartbreaking result for Fabiano and quite a favourable break for Topalov.
Candidates 2016
Moscow, Russia
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Svidler, Peter – Aronian, Levon
A29 English, Bremen 3…Bb4
1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3 e5 3.g3 Bb4 4.Bg2 O-O 5.e4 Bxc3 6.bxc3 c6 7.Nf3 Nxe4 8.O-O d6 9.Nxe5 Nc5 10.Ng4 f5 11.Ne3 f4 12.d4 fxe3 13.dxc5 exf2+ 14.Rxf2 Rxf2 15.Kxf2 Qf8+ 16.Qf3 Qxf3+ 17.Bxf3 dxc5 18.Bf4 Nd7 19.Bd6 Nb6 20.Re1 Bd7 21.Bxc5 Re8 22.Rb1 Be6 23.Bxb6 axb6 24.Rxb6 Bc8 25.Rb4 Re5 26.Ra4 Kf7 27.Ra8 Bf5 28.Be2 Re7 29.c5 Kf6 30.a4 Re5 31.Rf8+ Kg6 32.Rb8 Rxc5 33.Rxb7 Rxc3 34.a5 Bd3 35.Bxd3+ Rxd3 36.a6 c5 37.a7 Ra3 38.Ke2 c4 39.Kd2 h5 40.Kc2 c3 41.h4 1/2-1/2
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Caruana, Fabiano – Topalov, Veselin
C50 Giuoco Piano
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.O-O Nf6 5.d3 d6 6.c3 h6 7.a4 a5 8.Re1 O-O 9.Na3 Re8 10.Nc2 Ba7 11.Be3 Be6 12.Bb5 Bd7 13.Bxa7 Nxa7 14.Bc4 Nc8 15.Ne3 Nb6 16.Bb3 c6 17.h3 Be6 18.Bc2 Qc7 19.d4 Nc4 20.Nxc4 Bxc4 21.Qd2 Rad8 22.Rad1 Be6 23.Qe3 b6 24.Nd2 c5 25.Bd3 Re7 26.d5 Bd7 27.Ra1 Nh5 28.b4 Nf4 29.bxa5 bxa5 30.Reb1 Rf8 31.Bb5 Bc8 32.Bf1 f5 33.c4 Ref7 34.Ra3 fxe4 35.Nxe4 Bf5 36.Rab3 Bg6 37.Rb6 Qe7 38.Nxd6 Nxh3+ 39.Qxh3 Rf6 40.Nc8 Qd8 41.R1b5 Rxf2 42.Rxg6 Rxf1+ 43.Kh2 Qxc8 44.Qxc8 Rxc8 45.Rc6 Re8 46.Rcxc5 e4 47.d6 Rd8 48.Rc6 Rd1 49.c5 e3 50.Rb2 Rd2 51.Rb1 e2 52.Re1 Rf8 1/2-1/2
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Karjakin, Sergey – Anand, Viswanathan
A06 Reti Opening
1.Nf3 d5 2.e3 Nf6 3.c4 e6 4.b3 Be7 5.Bb2 O-O 6.Nc3 c5 7.cxd5 Nxd5 8.Qc2 Nc6 9.h4 b6 10.a3 f5 11.Bb5 Bb7 12.Nxd5 exd5 13.d4 Rc8 14.dxc5 bxc5 15.O-O Bf6 16.Rfd1 Ne7 17.Bxf6 Rxf6 18.g3 Ba6 19.Bxa6 Rxa6 20.Qc3 Rb6 21.Rac1 Qd6 22.Ne5 Rb7 23.Nd3 c4 24.bxc4 Rxc4 25.Qe5 Qxe5 26.Nxe5 Rxc1 27.Rxc1 g6 28.Rc5 Kg7 29.Ra5 Kf6 30.Nd3 Rc7 31.Ra6+ Kg7 32.Nf4 Rd7 33.Kf1 Ng8 34.Ne6+ Kf7 35.Nd4 Ne7 36.Nb5 Nc8 37.a4 Rb7 38.Rc6 Ne7 39.Ra6 Nc8 40.Rc6 Ne7 41.Rd6 Rb6 42.Rd7 a6 43.Nc3 1-0
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Nakamura, Hikaru – Giri, Anish
D46 QGD, Semi-Slav
1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e3 e6 5.Nf3 Nbd7 6.Qc2 Bd6 7.Be2 O-O 8.O-O dxc4 9.Bxc4 b5 10.Be2 Bb7 11.e4 e5 12.dxe5 Nxe5 13.Nd4 Neg4 14.g3 Re8 15.Nf5 Bc5 16.Bf4 Qb6 17.Kg2 g6 18.h3 Ne5 19.Nh6+ Kg7 20.Bg5 Bd4 21.Bxf6+ Kxf6 22.f4 Nc4 23.Bxc4 bxc4 24.f5 c5 25.fxg6+ Kxg6 26.Nxf7 Rf8 27.Nd5 Qxb2 28.Ne7+ Kg7 29.Nf5+ Kg6 30.Ne7+ Kg7 31.Nf5+ Kg6 32.Ne7+ 1/2-1/2
(Mark Crowther) - I think the last time Anand lost a game in a tournament of this format (Candidates/World Championship) was vs Morozevich San Luis 2005 in R7
Thus, Sergey Karjakin is leading the tournament.
Scores: Karjakin 3, Aronian 2.5, Anand 2, Giri 2, Svidler 2, Caruana 2, Nakamura 1.5 and Topalov 1.
Next Round: Giri-Svidler, Anand-Nakamura, Topalov-Karjakin and Aronian-Caruana.
Answers to the Quiz Questions
It is my belief that these are the correct answers but I couldn’t double check them because the transmission on the Official Site ceased.
I would give a strong opinion about this but the legal firm of Shekhovtsov & Partners is looking over my shoulder. (Readers of The Pickwick Papers will remember the unscrupulous Messrs Dodson and Fogg)
1) FIDE first awarded the Grandmaster title in 1950 to 27 players.
The number of grandmasters presently is 1512.
2) After 5 matches (1984-1990), they had played a total of 144 games, Kasparov won 21, Karpov won 19 and there were 104 draws.
Candidates 2016, Moscow
March 15. 2016
Round Four
Alexandra and Evgeny are the commentators as usual. Egor Piskunov is fielding questions from the viewers.
An hour or so into the broadcast, Daniil Dubov replaces Evgeny for a while. He is the 19-year-old Russian who got his grandmaster title at the age of 14 years, 11 months. He has the lugubrious look of a young Steve Buscemi.
There is an electronic count-down clock, which is unofficial. One knows that there is zero-tolerance if a player is not at the board at the start but the Arbiter would make the final decision before forfeiting the late player.
Egor shows some of the security features – notably a bank of lockerettes for people to put their cell phones in so they don’t take them into the playing hall. Each visitor is scanned with a portable electronic wand by the security guard.
The wallpaper has white objects on a black background. The white things look ever so much like magnified images of diatoms, if you can cast your mind back to Biology 101.
One viewer’s question was interesting:
Which chess match has impressed you the most?
My generation would instantly reply Fischer-Spassky, 1972. But that is old hat now.
Alexandra replies that for her it was the games of Karpov-Kasparov, Moscow 1984. After 5 months and 48 games, the match was abandoned in controversial circumstances with Karpov leading five wins to three (with 40 draws), and replayed in the World Chess Championship 1985. She talked to Karpov about it, sympathizing with the pressure of world attention, the same opponent and playing month after month.
For Evgeny, the match that impressed him was the playoff between Peter Svidler and Sergey Karjakin in the Baku World Cup of October, 2015. There was a total of ten games – four regular, four rapid and two blitz – all wins or losses and no draws, with Sergey finally winning by 6-4.
Egor gives a question as to whether Karjakin is playing “street chess” in this tournament?
The commentators are at a loss. Is “street chess” the rough and tumble coffee house chess or down and dirty chess where no rules apply? Sorry, no answer here.
There is a filmed interview with Kramnik where he wholly supports the rights of the organizers to do what they want with their broadcast and coverage. He adds that has all been legally approved. I will say nothing critical about this here because I fear that letter from Shekhovtsov & Partners.
The two quiz question to ponder over (with answers given at the end of this post) are:
1) All the participants in this tournament are grandmasters. When was the GM title first awarded by FIDE and how many of them were there at that time?
2) In the Karpov-Kasparov matches how many games were played in total and what was their final score against each other?
Alexandra is asked if she will try for the world title again. She became Women’s World Chess Champion in 2008 by beating Hou Yifan in the final. Alexandra says that she needs the motivation for that goal and at the moment she is not so ambitious.
The first game to finish is Nakamura – Giri. It was a Semi-Slav which they both had analyzed very deeply and although Giri’s king was flushed out into the open, there was no way to make progress and Nakamura forced a perpetual.
Svidler-Aronian was a slightly odd English opening which produced a small edge for Svidler but Levon Aronian found the moves to escape any long-term problems, though he was temporarily down a pawn. In the end, the players agreed to a draw in a rook-and-pawn endgame where no one could make any progress.
The description of the one win this round on the Official Site: A strange opening by Karjakin, who had White against Anand. While Anand struggled to find a concrete plan, Karjakin was able to saddle Anand with hanging pawns on the c and d files. Anand eventually advanced one of them, which was traded off, but that left the other one very weak and with Anand having to play passive defense. Such a position is ideal for Karjakin, whose technical skills are second to none and he slowly ground Anand down. Anand resigned as Karjakin was about to win a pawn and be able to force a trade of all remaining pieces, leaving with an easily won king-and-pawn ending.
And Sagar Shah on Caruana-Topalov:
It was a refreshing change in the opening as Caruana, instead of going for the Ruy Lopez, played the Guioco Piano as White. Both the players handled the opening phase of the game quite well and the position was relatively balanced. In the middle game Caruana shut the centre with the move d4-d5 and the game became quite sharp. Fabiano’s play was attached with queenside play while Veselin tried to create inroads in the kingside with f5 break. In mutual time trouble Topalov went completely wrong and simply blundered. It was such a winning position for the American that a full point for him was a foregone conclusion. However, Caruana blundered, and surprisingly it was the 41st move! The win was no longer apparent and in the rook endgame the game was simply drawn. A heartbreaking result for Fabiano and quite a favourable break for Topalov.
Candidates 2016
Moscow, Russia
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Svidler, Peter – Aronian, Levon
A29 English, Bremen 3…Bb4
1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3 e5 3.g3 Bb4 4.Bg2 O-O 5.e4 Bxc3 6.bxc3 c6 7.Nf3 Nxe4 8.O-O d6 9.Nxe5 Nc5 10.Ng4 f5 11.Ne3 f4 12.d4 fxe3 13.dxc5 exf2+ 14.Rxf2 Rxf2 15.Kxf2 Qf8+ 16.Qf3 Qxf3+ 17.Bxf3 dxc5 18.Bf4 Nd7 19.Bd6 Nb6 20.Re1 Bd7 21.Bxc5 Re8 22.Rb1 Be6 23.Bxb6 axb6 24.Rxb6 Bc8 25.Rb4 Re5 26.Ra4 Kf7 27.Ra8 Bf5 28.Be2 Re7 29.c5 Kf6 30.a4 Re5 31.Rf8+ Kg6 32.Rb8 Rxc5 33.Rxb7 Rxc3 34.a5 Bd3 35.Bxd3+ Rxd3 36.a6 c5 37.a7 Ra3 38.Ke2 c4 39.Kd2 h5 40.Kc2 c3 41.h4 1/2-1/2
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Caruana, Fabiano – Topalov, Veselin
C50 Giuoco Piano
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.O-O Nf6 5.d3 d6 6.c3 h6 7.a4 a5 8.Re1 O-O 9.Na3 Re8 10.Nc2 Ba7 11.Be3 Be6 12.Bb5 Bd7 13.Bxa7 Nxa7 14.Bc4 Nc8 15.Ne3 Nb6 16.Bb3 c6 17.h3 Be6 18.Bc2 Qc7 19.d4 Nc4 20.Nxc4 Bxc4 21.Qd2 Rad8 22.Rad1 Be6 23.Qe3 b6 24.Nd2 c5 25.Bd3 Re7 26.d5 Bd7 27.Ra1 Nh5 28.b4 Nf4 29.bxa5 bxa5 30.Reb1 Rf8 31.Bb5 Bc8 32.Bf1 f5 33.c4 Ref7 34.Ra3 fxe4 35.Nxe4 Bf5 36.Rab3 Bg6 37.Rb6 Qe7 38.Nxd6 Nxh3+ 39.Qxh3 Rf6 40.Nc8 Qd8 41.R1b5 Rxf2 42.Rxg6 Rxf1+ 43.Kh2 Qxc8 44.Qxc8 Rxc8 45.Rc6 Re8 46.Rcxc5 e4 47.d6 Rd8 48.Rc6 Rd1 49.c5 e3 50.Rb2 Rd2 51.Rb1 e2 52.Re1 Rf8 1/2-1/2
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Karjakin, Sergey – Anand, Viswanathan
A06 Reti Opening
1.Nf3 d5 2.e3 Nf6 3.c4 e6 4.b3 Be7 5.Bb2 O-O 6.Nc3 c5 7.cxd5 Nxd5 8.Qc2 Nc6 9.h4 b6 10.a3 f5 11.Bb5 Bb7 12.Nxd5 exd5 13.d4 Rc8 14.dxc5 bxc5 15.O-O Bf6 16.Rfd1 Ne7 17.Bxf6 Rxf6 18.g3 Ba6 19.Bxa6 Rxa6 20.Qc3 Rb6 21.Rac1 Qd6 22.Ne5 Rb7 23.Nd3 c4 24.bxc4 Rxc4 25.Qe5 Qxe5 26.Nxe5 Rxc1 27.Rxc1 g6 28.Rc5 Kg7 29.Ra5 Kf6 30.Nd3 Rc7 31.Ra6+ Kg7 32.Nf4 Rd7 33.Kf1 Ng8 34.Ne6+ Kf7 35.Nd4 Ne7 36.Nb5 Nc8 37.a4 Rb7 38.Rc6 Ne7 39.Ra6 Nc8 40.Rc6 Ne7 41.Rd6 Rb6 42.Rd7 a6 43.Nc3 1-0
Round 4, March 15, 2016
Nakamura, Hikaru – Giri, Anish
D46 QGD, Semi-Slav
1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e3 e6 5.Nf3 Nbd7 6.Qc2 Bd6 7.Be2 O-O 8.O-O dxc4 9.Bxc4 b5 10.Be2 Bb7 11.e4 e5 12.dxe5 Nxe5 13.Nd4 Neg4 14.g3 Re8 15.Nf5 Bc5 16.Bf4 Qb6 17.Kg2 g6 18.h3 Ne5 19.Nh6+ Kg7 20.Bg5 Bd4 21.Bxf6+ Kxf6 22.f4 Nc4 23.Bxc4 bxc4 24.f5 c5 25.fxg6+ Kxg6 26.Nxf7 Rf8 27.Nd5 Qxb2 28.Ne7+ Kg7 29.Nf5+ Kg6 30.Ne7+ Kg7 31.Nf5+ Kg6 32.Ne7+ 1/2-1/2
(Mark Crowther) - I think the last time Anand lost a game in a tournament of this format (Candidates/World Championship) was vs Morozevich San Luis 2005 in R7
Thus, Sergey Karjakin is leading the tournament.
Scores: Karjakin 3, Aronian 2.5, Anand 2, Giri 2, Svidler 2, Caruana 2, Nakamura 1.5 and Topalov 1.
Next Round: Giri-Svidler, Anand-Nakamura, Topalov-Karjakin and Aronian-Caruana.
Answers to the Quiz Questions
It is my belief that these are the correct answers but I couldn’t double check them because the transmission on the Official Site ceased.
I would give a strong opinion about this but the legal firm of Shekhovtsov & Partners is looking over my shoulder. (Readers of The Pickwick Papers will remember the unscrupulous Messrs Dodson and Fogg)
1) FIDE first awarded the Grandmaster title in 1950 to 27 players.
The number of grandmasters presently is 1512.
2) After 5 matches (1984-1990), they had played a total of 144 games, Kasparov won 21, Karpov won 19 and there were 104 draws.
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