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Round 10 – Wednesday March 27, 2013
The rules state that all photographs have to be taken in the first five minutes of the games. Even so the players go at it as if the dozen photographers are not there.
Nigel Short and Lawrence Trent are the commentators again. Lawrence introduces Nigel as grandmaster, distinguished MBE, the lad from Bolton and Nigel says that he is also a gold Blue Peter badge holder.
(Blue Peter was a popular BBC children’s television program).
Aronian must push for a win against a slightly wobbly Ivanchuk. The latter plays the Budapest Gambit giving up a central pawn. Here Nigel quotes a verse from the musical My Fair Lady:
Every time I looked around/ There he was, that hairy hound from Budapest/ Never leaving us alone/ never have I ever known/ A ruder pest/
Nothing against Hungarians in general, just that you’ll remember Zoltan Karparthy was nosing around, trying to find out Liza Doolittle’s origin.
The Budapest is not seen that often. Vassily just wanted to play it and he played it! Aronian did not play the best moves but was happy with his position. Vassily said that he had good compensation for the pawn.
+++++++
(Short) Vladimir told me once that he was on a mission to force people to give up playing e4 in the opening. If you play d4, the centre pawn is protected but e4 is not. He did the Berlin numerous times against Kasparov in the WC 2000 in London.
++++++
(Nigel analyzing the Aronian – Ivanchuk game). Easy play for black but he is still a pawn down. All this has been seen before. I’ve seen the Dutch grandmaster Dimitri Reinderman play this. He has the funny hair – blue hair, or green hair or pink hair.
(Trent) Why don’t you come in for the remainder of the tournament with different coloured hair each day?
(Short) I did dye it blond at one time until I realized I looked like a total prat. I had long hair and was in to Heavy Metal then.
(Trent) You are not anymore? (Short) Still am. My tastes are a little more sophisticated now. I have matured somewhat.
Reindeer man has played this and it’s OK. Maybe Chukky is going to win with black. That would set the cat among the pigeons!
++++++++++
(Analyzing Carlsen-Gelfand) I lost to Michael Krishinkov in Libya with a 30-second move increment and the toilet was far away. Normally you are close but we were playing in a colossal hall and you had to go outside the hall and then walk 200 metres outside of the flipping hotel. I was suffering and I dropped a piece because the toilets weren’t closer. From move 17 for the next 50 moves I was stuck there and it was terrible. I would make my move and couldn’t get up because he would reply immediately. A nice chap but but he plays against your bladder.
(Can anyone help here? I simply cannot find the spelling of Michael’s last name)
++++++++
The guys talk for almost half an hour on and off about what syllable to accent in Radjabov and are told finally by Maria offstage that it is RadJAbov.
Nigel says that he once walked in his sleep and terrified his brother. The expression “in like flint” is used and this leads Nigel to ask where Errol Flynn was from. He says it was Tasmania. The great actor was no good at chess but did play cricket! He talks about a band called Stealers Wheel, which I have never heard of so will not comment on.
+++++++++
(Grischuk-Kramnik) There was a game with the Berlin, Harmonist vs Tarrasch in the 19th century. It is in My Great Predecessors. Who has a copy? (Nigel) I just think it is one of the great unread series of all time. It sold tens of thousands of copies because it looks very good on your shelves. It has a lot of analysis and no one reads them. Harmonist was a ballet dancer.
++++
(Radjabov-Svidler) Radjabov is offering a draw. There is a lot of pressure on him because his country’s oil company is sponsoring the tournament. You want to put in an effort with the white pieces. But he has lost games against Aronian, Carlsen and Vassily - tough games and is depressed. We have all been there. We are human.
+++++++
(Carlsen-Gelfand) Gelfand has a queen looking down at the pawn on b2. That is a poisoned pawn. Nigel says on that subject that he remembers playing in historic Novgorod in the 1990s. It has the oldest Kremlin in Russia and they opened by the river what they called a “wedding embankment”. They had a young couple of newlyweds there and they asked chess players from the tournament to speak at the celebrations. Ivanchuk spoke and said that getting married was like taking the pawn on b2 in the Sicilian. The famous poison pawn variation! It was quite funny. There were two newly wed couples. I met one of the girls at the wedding next year and she was had got a divorce. Queen takes b2 is like getting married.
+++++++
Nigel has colourful phrases, which he uses in his verbal annotations. A position can be Angela Murky (after Angela Merkel). A knight is called Harry the Horse (after a Damon Runyon character), getting married is taking the poisoned pawn on b2 and the a pawn is Alfred the pawn, and any old move is “any old iron” – from a music hall song, I believe.
He told a story about himself and a dog, which is too long to give here, so I will put it in another thread called Dangerous Chess.
++++++++++++
(On Ivanchuk’s time-trouble) When he was playing his match against Kasparov in 1993, Nigel said that he used up incredible amounts of time on nothing moves. He wonders now what on earth he was thinking about. It is a question of rhythm. He had a good second half playing much faster but was wiped out in the first half. It is indecision and lack of confidence and questioning your own ability. Some also suffer from perfection: they see a good move and spend lots of time looking for a better move. What is it they say, “Best is the enemy of good”. And in chess, it is more important to play good moves fast than to look for the best move.
++++++++++
Trent thinks that whoever wins the most games – Aronian? should win the tournament. They will talk about the tie-breaks another day.
++++++++
Carlsen is just too good a player. It’s really unfair. Perhaps he should be handicapped like in golf. He could stand on his head. A horse tranquilizer might be an idea just to make competition fair.
Nigel said, “Did you ever see the video of The Who concert where Keith Moon took some horse tranquilizer? He collapsed. They got someone from the audience to take his place.
Carlsen is a machine. World champions play like machines. Karpov was a machine. Was Alexander Khalifman a machine? Capablanca was a machine. Because they were good. The Turk was a machine until they found out that he wasn’t a machine but a man in a machine.
(I would appreciate help with the spelling of Nigel’s bladder opponent above and the town with the wedding embankment. I am sure I misheard them) WK
The rules state that all photographs have to be taken in the first five minutes of the games. Even so the players go at it as if the dozen photographers are not there.
Nigel Short and Lawrence Trent are the commentators again. Lawrence introduces Nigel as grandmaster, distinguished MBE, the lad from Bolton and Nigel says that he is also a gold Blue Peter badge holder.
(Blue Peter was a popular BBC children’s television program).
Aronian must push for a win against a slightly wobbly Ivanchuk. The latter plays the Budapest Gambit giving up a central pawn. Here Nigel quotes a verse from the musical My Fair Lady:
Every time I looked around/ There he was, that hairy hound from Budapest/ Never leaving us alone/ never have I ever known/ A ruder pest/
Nothing against Hungarians in general, just that you’ll remember Zoltan Karparthy was nosing around, trying to find out Liza Doolittle’s origin.
The Budapest is not seen that often. Vassily just wanted to play it and he played it! Aronian did not play the best moves but was happy with his position. Vassily said that he had good compensation for the pawn.
+++++++
(Short) Vladimir told me once that he was on a mission to force people to give up playing e4 in the opening. If you play d4, the centre pawn is protected but e4 is not. He did the Berlin numerous times against Kasparov in the WC 2000 in London.
++++++
(Nigel analyzing the Aronian – Ivanchuk game). Easy play for black but he is still a pawn down. All this has been seen before. I’ve seen the Dutch grandmaster Dimitri Reinderman play this. He has the funny hair – blue hair, or green hair or pink hair.
(Trent) Why don’t you come in for the remainder of the tournament with different coloured hair each day?
(Short) I did dye it blond at one time until I realized I looked like a total prat. I had long hair and was in to Heavy Metal then.
(Trent) You are not anymore? (Short) Still am. My tastes are a little more sophisticated now. I have matured somewhat.
Reindeer man has played this and it’s OK. Maybe Chukky is going to win with black. That would set the cat among the pigeons!
++++++++++
(Analyzing Carlsen-Gelfand) I lost to Michael Krishinkov in Libya with a 30-second move increment and the toilet was far away. Normally you are close but we were playing in a colossal hall and you had to go outside the hall and then walk 200 metres outside of the flipping hotel. I was suffering and I dropped a piece because the toilets weren’t closer. From move 17 for the next 50 moves I was stuck there and it was terrible. I would make my move and couldn’t get up because he would reply immediately. A nice chap but but he plays against your bladder.
(Can anyone help here? I simply cannot find the spelling of Michael’s last name)
++++++++
The guys talk for almost half an hour on and off about what syllable to accent in Radjabov and are told finally by Maria offstage that it is RadJAbov.
Nigel says that he once walked in his sleep and terrified his brother. The expression “in like flint” is used and this leads Nigel to ask where Errol Flynn was from. He says it was Tasmania. The great actor was no good at chess but did play cricket! He talks about a band called Stealers Wheel, which I have never heard of so will not comment on.
+++++++++
(Grischuk-Kramnik) There was a game with the Berlin, Harmonist vs Tarrasch in the 19th century. It is in My Great Predecessors. Who has a copy? (Nigel) I just think it is one of the great unread series of all time. It sold tens of thousands of copies because it looks very good on your shelves. It has a lot of analysis and no one reads them. Harmonist was a ballet dancer.
++++
(Radjabov-Svidler) Radjabov is offering a draw. There is a lot of pressure on him because his country’s oil company is sponsoring the tournament. You want to put in an effort with the white pieces. But he has lost games against Aronian, Carlsen and Vassily - tough games and is depressed. We have all been there. We are human.
+++++++
(Carlsen-Gelfand) Gelfand has a queen looking down at the pawn on b2. That is a poisoned pawn. Nigel says on that subject that he remembers playing in historic Novgorod in the 1990s. It has the oldest Kremlin in Russia and they opened by the river what they called a “wedding embankment”. They had a young couple of newlyweds there and they asked chess players from the tournament to speak at the celebrations. Ivanchuk spoke and said that getting married was like taking the pawn on b2 in the Sicilian. The famous poison pawn variation! It was quite funny. There were two newly wed couples. I met one of the girls at the wedding next year and she was had got a divorce. Queen takes b2 is like getting married.
+++++++
Nigel has colourful phrases, which he uses in his verbal annotations. A position can be Angela Murky (after Angela Merkel). A knight is called Harry the Horse (after a Damon Runyon character), getting married is taking the poisoned pawn on b2 and the a pawn is Alfred the pawn, and any old move is “any old iron” – from a music hall song, I believe.
He told a story about himself and a dog, which is too long to give here, so I will put it in another thread called Dangerous Chess.
++++++++++++
(On Ivanchuk’s time-trouble) When he was playing his match against Kasparov in 1993, Nigel said that he used up incredible amounts of time on nothing moves. He wonders now what on earth he was thinking about. It is a question of rhythm. He had a good second half playing much faster but was wiped out in the first half. It is indecision and lack of confidence and questioning your own ability. Some also suffer from perfection: they see a good move and spend lots of time looking for a better move. What is it they say, “Best is the enemy of good”. And in chess, it is more important to play good moves fast than to look for the best move.
++++++++++
Trent thinks that whoever wins the most games – Aronian? should win the tournament. They will talk about the tie-breaks another day.
++++++++
Carlsen is just too good a player. It’s really unfair. Perhaps he should be handicapped like in golf. He could stand on his head. A horse tranquilizer might be an idea just to make competition fair.
Nigel said, “Did you ever see the video of The Who concert where Keith Moon took some horse tranquilizer? He collapsed. They got someone from the audience to take his place.
Carlsen is a machine. World champions play like machines. Karpov was a machine. Was Alexander Khalifman a machine? Capablanca was a machine. Because they were good. The Turk was a machine until they found out that he wasn’t a machine but a man in a machine.
(I would appreciate help with the spelling of Nigel’s bladder opponent above and the town with the wedding embankment. I am sure I misheard them) WK
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