Berg & Kotronias favorites in Limburg

This weekend ChessVibes will be covering the 2nd Limburg Open tournament, which involves almost 400 participants and no less than 25 titled players. GMs Emanuel Berg & Vassilios Kotronias are the favorites.

In Maastricht, the Netherlands this Whitsun weekend the 2nd ENCI Limburg Open takes place. Venue is the beautiful campus of the Leeuwenborgh Opleidingen. ChessVibes will bring on-the-spot coverage.

The schedule:

Friday 9 May 19.00-24.00 1st Round

Saturday 10 May 11.00-16.00 2nd round 17.30-22.30 3rd round

Sunday 11 May 11.00-16.00 4th Round 17.30-22.30 5th Round

Monday 12 May 09.00-14.00 6th Round 15.30-20.30 7th Round

The top 8 boards can be followed live online.




Favorites for tournament victory are 8 times champion of Greece and his country's no. 1 GM Vassilios Kotronias (2611) and Swedish number one GM Emanuel Berg (2601). GM Dimitri Reinderman, who recently finished second at the Dutch Championship, must be seen as a serious candidate as well.

They will be competing with GM Friso Nijboer from the Netherlands, GM Alexandre Dgebuadze (2007 Belgian Champion), GM Gawain Jones (UK), GM Thomas Luther (Germany), GM Vladimir Epishin (Russia), GM Vladimir Petkov (Bulgaria) and WGM Eva Moser (Austria) - a total of ten grandmasters.

The list of strong outsiders include IMs Sergy Klimov, Puchen Wang, Spas Kozhuharov and the two young Dutch IMs Robin Swinkels en Chiel van Oosterom.

During the tournament there will be commentary to the games IM Herman Grooten (Saturday), 9 times Limburg champion Jack Renet (Sunday) and IM Johan van Mil (Monday) and GM Paul van der Sterren (Sunday and Monday) en this can be followed live online at the tournament website.