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Dortmund Round 5

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Submitted by SonofPearl on Fri, 07/04/2008 at 11:27am.

Lowest ranked player leads at Dormund!

A short tournament like Dortmund can throw up surprises, as it has done in previous years, and after round 5 the sole leader of the 2008 event is Jan Gustafsson (pictured), Elo 2603 from Germany. 

Before the tournament I had never heard of Gustafsson, but if he can hang on to his slender lead for the remaining rounds he will certainly make a name for himself.

Gustafsson took the lead by half a point by winning for a second time - his victim today being the Dutchman Loek Van Wely in an embarrassingly brief 18 moves!  Up to move 13 appears to be theory, but after 14. Be2 White just loses another pawn to go three pawns down and Loek resigned soon after.

Loek gets invites to many of the top tournaments but often seems to struggle with the competition at this exalted level.

Chucky finally woke up to record his first win of the event against Kramnik's round 4 nemesis, Arkadij Naiditsch.  In a QGD, Ivanchuk saddled his opponent with doubled, isolated a-pawns and his superior knight won the day in the ending. 

The results in round 5:

Leko, Peter - Nepomniachtchi, Ian ½-½ 30 B52 Sicilian Rossolimo
Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar - Kramnik, Vladimir ½-½ 40 E15 Queens Indian
Ivanchuk, Vassily - Naiditsch, Arkadij 1-0 53 D37 QGD 5.Bf4
Van Wely, Loek - Gustafsson, Jan 0-1 18 D31 Semi-Slav Defence

 

The standings after round 5:

1 
Gustafsson, Jan   GER   2603 
*   .   .   ½   ½   ½   1 1 3½  
2 
Leko, Peter  HUN  2741 
.  *  ½  ½  1 ½  .  ½  3
3 
Nepomniachtchi, Ian  RUS  2634 
.  ½  *  ½  ½  .  ½  1 3
4 
Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar  AZE  2752 
½  ½  ½  *  .  ½  ½  .  2½ 
5 
Ivanchuk, Vassily  UKR  2740 
½  0 ½  .  *  .  1 ½  2½ 
6 
Kramnik, Vladimir  RUS  2788 
½  ½  .  ½  .  *  0 1 2½ 
7 
Naiditsch, Arkadij  GER  2624 
0 .  ½  ½  0 1 *  .  2
8 
Van Wely, Loek  NED  2677 
0 ½  0 .  ½  0 .  *  1

 

 

 



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| 1601 reads | 2 comments |
3 votes:
 

Comments:

by eternaloptimist - 11 months ago
Orange Beach, AL United States
Member Since: Feb 2008
Member Points: 1752

Who would have thought Gustafsson would be tied for first @ this point? He's the lowest ranked player in the trnt. & yet he's the lone person in the lead. Of course it does tend to put less pressure on someone if he isn't expected to do well. I hope he wins this trnt. (because he's the underdog), but he's still got his work cut out for him. He has to face both of the players tied for 2nd-3rd (Leko & Nepo). Hopefully Leko will "peter" out @ the end of this trnt. :D & Nepo will do likewise. He is actually a good bit older than he looks like in this picture (29 years old) & has a lot of experience. & on the other side of the spectrum, what's up w/ Van Wely? He played horribly in this game & made things really easy for Gustafsson.    


by Phobetor - 11 months ago
International
Member Since: Aug 2007
Member Points: 1108

Van Wely usually gets invitations for Corus because he's one of the best players from the Netherlands. But besides Corus I don't think he plays in super events that often.

Anyway, his game today was just horrible. What was he thinking with 13. Bf3? and 14. Be2??

He already dropped alot on the last rating list. At the link you can see he had been hanging around 2670+ for nearly two years, and that he only dropped below 2640 once in the last 8,5 years. But now his expected change is already -9 and this tournament surely won't help him to get 2640+ again.

 

And it's nice to see Ivanchuk win again. It's a pity he didn't get the 2790+ rating on the July list yet, but maybe he can keep his good form for another three months and end up with 2790+ or even higher on the October list. He'll need at least a +1 score at Dortmund not to drop though, since he's rated above average here. And he still has games with Kramnik and Mamedyarov left...


 
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