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A review from 2000 year 

The First Daily Chess Newspaper on the Net Editors: GM Alexander Baburin, GM Ruslan Scherbakov, and IM Vladimir Barsky. Issue No. 1, 7th November 2000

THE 34th CHESS OLYMPIAD in Istanbul is certainly the main event of the moment, but there are quite a few other important tournaments, just finished or still in progress. In the men's Olympiad yesterday, the leaders - Germany - lost to Ukraine (1½-2½). Russia lost by the same score to Bulgaria, which is becoming a bit of a habit. Russia lost on the top two boards (Topalov-Khalifman 1-0, Svidler-Kiril Georgiev 0-1), but 17-year old Grischuk won on board 4. After 9 rounds the standing is as follows: 1-2 Armenia and Germany - 25 points 3 Ukraine - 24½ points 4-5 Bulgaria and Russia - 24 points 6-7 Hungary and Romania - 23½ points 8-9 USA and Israel - 22½ points Today the key matches are Armenia-Germany, Ukraine-Bulgaria, Russia Romania, Hungary-USA, and IsraelDenmark. In the women's Olympiad, the standing is 1 China - 21 points 2 Georgia - 20½ points 3-4 Russia and Netherlands - 18½ points 5 Ukraine - 18 points Today Ukraine plays against China, Georgia against Romania and Russia against the Netherlands. There are 5 more rounds to play at the event. You can find Alex Baburin's daily report from Istanbul at www.gmsquare.com, while the official site is at www.istanbulchessolympiad.com French Chess Federation, has been running since 1994 and regularly attracts a very strong field. This year it clashed with the Chess Olympiad in Turkey, which made the event a bit weaker than usual. 16 players were divided into 2 groups. The four best players from each group continued using a knockout formula. In the final, Mikhail Gurevich of Belgium defeated Anatoly Karpov of Russia 2½-1½, despite losing the first game. Please refer to http://www.asmeg.org/echecs/frame.htm. for more information. Another strong rapid chess tournament was held in Bastia, Corsica. There, 32 players first played 7 rounds and then 8 qualifiers continued in a knockout. In the final Vishy Anand beat Stefan Djuric 2-0. For more information see http://www.echecs.asso.fr, dedicated to the 150th anniversary of the birth of the great Russian player, is taking place in St. Petersburg now. It is a very strong open - with 50 GMs and 57 IMs among its 235 participants. The Elo favorites are GMs Lastin (2633), Dolmatov (2600), Najer (2590) and Balashov (2590).

THE VIII CHIGORIN MEMORIAL After five rounds 6 players are sharing the lead on 4½ points: V. Filippov, A. Korotylev, M. Turov, E. Najer, Y. Ulko and R. Scherbakov. This 9-round tournament will finish on the 10th November. For more information please refer to http://www.gmchess.com (site of GM Khalifman) and http://www.totalchess.spb.ru (new site of St. Petersburg Chess Federation). We have heard that a strong closed tournament might take place in St. Petersburg at the end of the year, as a part of Chigorin's anniversary celebrations. In Bad Wiessee (Germany, near Munich) the 4th Bavarian Masters Open finished recently. It saw a four-way tie between Alexander Nenashev (UZB), Gerard Hertneck (GER), Konstantin Lerner (UKR) and Roland Ekstroem, who scored 7½ out of 9 each. The title of the Bavarian Champion went on a tiebreak to Nenashev, who now lives in Germany. 20 players finished with 7 points. For more information please refer to http://www.schach-amtegernsee.de/oib2000 It seems that matches are becoming increasingly popular nowadays. We have seen quite a few in recent months. For example, Oral - Alexandrov and M. Gurevich - Bologan. A match between two young chess stars took place in France recently. French player Maxime Vachier-Lagrave beat David Howell of England 5½-2½. France also staged two strong rapid chess tournaments. In the south of France,

THE 4th CAP D'AGDE FESTIVAL took place between 28th October and 4th November. This tournament, supported by the French Chess Federation, has been running since 1994 and regularly attracts a very strong field. This year it clashed with the Chess Olympiad in Turkey, which made the event a bit weaker than usual. 16 players were divided into 2 groups. The four best players from each group continued using a knockout formula. In the final, Mikhail Gurevich of Belgium defeated Anatoly Karpov of Russia 2½-1½, despite losing the first game. Please refer to http://www.asmeg.org/echecs/frame.htm. for more information. Another strong rapid chess tournament was held in Bastia, Corsica. There, 32 players first played 7 rounds and then 8 qualifiers continued in a knockout. In the final Vishy Anand beat Stefan Djuric 2-0. For more information see http://www.echecs.asso.fr

ANNOTATED GAME

Stefan Djuric - Vishy Anand
Rapid Chess, Bastia 2000
1 d4 d5 2 Bg5
Against 1...d5 the Trompovsky is not so
dangerous.
2...h6
The point of this move will become clear later.
It is useful to make sure that White's bishop does
not come back to the queenside.
3 Bh4 c6 4 e3 Qb6 5 b3 e5!
Now the advantages of including
2...h6 are obvious, as 6 dxe5?? loses to 6...Qb4+.
6 Nf3 e4 7 Nfd2 Be7
7...Ne7 is also worth considering here.
8 Bg3 Be6 9 Be2 Nf6 10 0—0 0—0 11 c4
Qd8 12 Nc3 Bd6 13 Bxd6 Qxd6 14 Rb1
Nbd7 15 a4 a5 16 c5 Qe7 17 Rb2 
 The plans of both sides have become clear -
White will play on the queenside, while Black
will try to attack the opposite wing. But first
Anand decides to gain some space on the
queenside too:
17...Rfb8 18 Qb1 b6!?
Otherwise, Black might be tied down to the
weak b7-pawn when White manages b3-b4.
19 cxb6 Rxb6 20 Rc1 Rab8 21 Bf1 h5!
Black obviously decided that it was time to
get active on 'his' flank.
22 Ne2 h4 23 Rbc2 Qd6 24 Nf4 Bf5

25 Rc5  White is after the a5-pawn, but with so many pieces on the queenside, his king is a bit lonely. 25...g5! 26 Ne2 Nf8 27 Qc2 Bd7 28 Rxa5? Better was 28 f3, as now Black's attack prevails 28...Ng4 29 g3 Qf6! 30 Nxe4 dxe4 31 Nc3 hxg3 32 hxg3 Qh6 33 Bg2 Rxb3 34 Nxe4 Rb2

35 Rxg5+ Ng6 36 Qc5 Qh2+ 37 Kf1 Nxe3+  0—1 Nice play by Anand!

Miscellaneous

As you probably already know, in
London Vladimir Kramnik defeated
Garry Kasparov 8½-6½.
The match got a lot of attention in the
chess world, but how about the general
public? Chess Today correspondent GM
Ruslan Scherbakov decided to visit the
match while in London. He knew the
name of the tube station nearest to where
the match was being played. But when he
asked at the station information desk,
nobody had heard of the names Kasparov
or Kramnik. He asked many passers-by,
but to no avail. The situation looked bad,
but then Ruslan called his wife in Russia
and asked her to find the exact address
on the Internet. After the second call, he
finally made it to the Riverside Studios.
So, does the future of chess rest only
with the Internet?!
Kramnik's victory was received with
enthusiasm by most of his colleagues.
But Kasparov enjoyed the same, if not
more, popularity 15 years ago. This
changed later when he coined some cute
phrases to describe his fellow
Grandmasters - like, for example,
'tourists'. Congratulating Vladimir on
his fine victory, Chess Today hopes that
the title of World Champion will not
change him and that he will remain as
open and friendly to all chess players as
he is now. Our newspaper will try to
arrange an interview with the World
Champion - please send your
questions. We will ask Vladimir which
the question he found the most interesting
and we will publish the name of that reader

Recommended links

www.gmsquare.com

www.istanbulchessolympiad.com

www.gmchess.com

www.totalchess.spb.ru

www.schach-am-tegernsee.de/oib2000

www.asmeg.org/echecs/frame.htm

www.echecs.asso.fr

Contact information

Do you want to
report a tournament or have a suggestion
concerning Chess Today? E-mail us at
ct@gmsquare.com. We always
appreciate your comments and feedback!
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Chess Today. Feel free to send them our
newspaper to sample - with more readers
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Chess Today is published by:
Alexander Baburin, 3 Eagle Hill,
Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland.
Tel: (353-1) 278-2276
Fax/phone: (353-1) 283-6839.
E-mail: ct@gmsquare.com
Website: www.chesstoday.net
Editors: GM Alexander Baburin, GM
Ruslan Scherbakov and IM Vladimir
Barsky.
Technical editor: Graham Brown.
Copyright © Chess Today and
Alexander Baburin 2000.
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