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Big upsets on first day round 2 World Cup

PeterDoggers
| 0 | Chess Event Coverage
The first day of the World Cup's second round saw quite a number of big upsets. Svidler lost with Black against Nyback, Morozevich went down with the white pieces against Laznicka, Sakaev defeated Radjabov, Ivanchuk lost to So and Inarkiev defeated Eljanov.

The FIDE World Chess Cup takes place November 20th-December 15th inn Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. It's a seven-round knockout with six rounds of matches comprising two games per round. The final seventh round consists of four games.

Round 1 (November 21-23): 128 playersRound 5 (December 3-5): 8 players
Round 2 (November 24-26): 64 playersRound 6 (December 6-8): 4 players
Round 3 (November 27-29): 32 players Round 7 (December 10-14): 2 players
Round 4 (November 30-December 2): 16 players



The time control is 90 minutes for the first 40 moves followed by 30 minutes for the rest of the game with an addition of 30 seconds per move from move one. Games start at 15:00h local time (11:00 CET).

Round 2, day 1

It was the world upside down today in Khanty-Mansyisk. The first seven rating favorites scored only 1.5 points and big names such as Ivanchuk, Svidler, Morozevich and Radjabov are in danger of an early knockout!

Top seeded player Boris Gelfand was again the first to finish his game today. Besides his famous "game after game" approach, his strategy in Khanty-Mansyisk is clear: draw with Black, try to win with White, and save energy wherever possible. His Petroff against Amonatov lasted just twelve moves, so the Israeli grandmaster clearly bets on his White game. And why not.

Many of the underdogs did well or very well today. Zhou Jianchao played an excellent game against Gashimov; in a Berlin Wall the Chinese 21-year-old even played a positional exchange sacrifice that kind of forced the draw immediately when Gashimov decided to go for an ending with opposite-coloured bishops.

Peter Svidler lost to Finnish grandmaster Tomi Nyback (against whom yours truly once managed to draw in a King's Indian; perhaps a better choice than the Grünfeld for a Peter? ;-) ) and here too all credits should go to the lower-rated player for what looks like a fine game. Nyback grabbed his chance at the right moment with the strong 30.e6!.

Peter Svidler, in danger of an early knockout



The third upset was Alexander Morozevich going down against Viktor Laznicka from the Czech Republic. The world's number 10 tried to trick his opponent but Laznicka gladly fell for it: he got a pawn and the bishop pair for the lost exchange, and then duly won when got a passed pawn on the queenside.

A bad start of round 2 for Alexander Morozevich



Radjabov was the next to falter on this crazy first day of round 2. Sakaev ran with his king from e1 to b3, but with all the important squares and the centre protected, White was fine. Soon an ending was reached where Black should have been fine as well, but suddenly Radjabov couldn't prevent the loss of a piece on the kingside.

Teimour Radjabov also needs a win tomorrow



The biggest surprise perhaps was the loss of Vassily Ivanchuk, the favourite to win this World Cup according to the ChessVibes visitors, against super-talent Wesley So. It seemed that the Ukrainian was totally outplaying his Pinoy opponent, but when he couldn't find the knockout blow he should probably have taken the draw. Instead, in terrible timetrouble already, Chuky decided to play on but then lost in the ending.

Ernesto Inarkiev, who was a bit lucky to qualify in yesterday's tiebreaks against Gustafsson, continued very well by defeating 84 points higher rated Pavel Eljanov - White powerplay in the Berlin Wall this time. Yu Yangyi proved to be more than a one-day fly and beat Polish GM Mateusz Bartel.

Ernesto Inarkiev: a good follow-up after yesterday's tiebreaks



World Cup 2007 finalist Shirov and winner Kamsky won their first game while Polgar, who had qualified without playing, started with a draw against Nisipeanu. Tomorrow 11:00 CET is the start of day 2 of round 2.

Alexei Shirov, still a favourite among the fans, did win his first game of round 2



All photos by Galina Popova | courtesy of FIDE



Games round 2, day 1



Game viewer by ChessTempo


FIDE World Cup - Round 2 day 1 results

































































NameNATG1G2R1R2R3R4B1B2B3B4B5B6B7B8B9B10SDTot
Round 2 Match 01
Amonatov,
Farrukh
TJK ½ 0.5
Gelfand,
Boris
ISR½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 02
Gashimov,
Vugar
AZE ½ 0.5
Zhou,
Jianchao
CHN½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 03
Nyback,
Tomi
FIN 1 1.0
Svidler,
Peter
RUS0 0
Round 2 Match 04
Morozevich,
Alexander
RUS 0 0.0
Laznicka,
Viktor
CZE1 1
Round 2 Match 05
Sakaev,
Konstantin
RUS 1 1.0
Radjabov,
Teimour
AZE0 0
Round 2 Match 06
Ivanchuk,
Vassily
UKR 0 0.0
So,
Wesley
PHI1 1
Round 2 Match 07
Akobian,
Varuzhan
USA ½ 0.5
Ponomariov,
Ruslan
UKR½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 08
Grischuk,
Alexander
RUS 1 1.0
Tkachiev,
Vladislav
FRA0 0
Round 2 Match 09
Sandipan,
Chanda
IND 0 0.0
Jakovenko,
Dmitry
RUS1 1
Round 2 Match 10
Wang,
Yue
CHN 1 1.0
Savchenko,
Boris
RUS0 0
Round 2 Match 11
Inarkiev,
Ernesto
RUS 1 1.0
Eljanov,
Pavel
UKR0 0
Round 2 Match 12
Karjakin,
Sergey
UKR ½ 0.5
Timofeev,
Artyom
RUS½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 13
Milov,
Vadim
SUI 0 0.0
Mamedyarov,
Shakhriyar
AZE1 1
Round 2 Match 14
Shirov,
Alexei
ESP 1 1.0
Fedorchuk,
Sergey A.
UKR0 0
Round 2 Match 15
Caruana,
Fabiano
ITA ½ 0.5
Dominguez Perez,
Leinier
CUB½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 16
Yu,
Yangyi
CHN 1 1.0
Bartel,
Mateusz
POL0 0
Round 2 Match 17
Meier,
Georg
GER ½ 0.5
Vachier-Lagrave,
Maxime
FRA½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 18
Alekseev,
Evgeny
RUS ½ 0.5
Fressinet,
Laurent
FRA½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 19
Khalifman,
Alexander
RUS ½ 0.5
Tomashevsky,
Evgeny
RUS½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 20
Wang,
Hao
CHN 1 1.0
Ganguly,
Surya Shekhar
IND0 0
Round 2 Match 21
Shabalov,
Alexander
USA ½ 0.5
Navara,
David
CZE½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 22
Malakhov,
Vladimir
RUS ½ 0.5
Smirin,
Ilia
ISR½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 23
Sasikiran,
Krishnan
IND 0 0.0
Bacrot,
Etienne
FRA1 1
Round 2 Match 24
Rublevsky,
Sergei
RUS ½ 0.5
Areshchenko,
Alexander
UKR½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 25
Iturrizaga,
Eduardo
VEN ½ 0.5
Jobava,
Baadur
GEO½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 26
Motylev,
Alexander
RUS 1 1.0
Najer,
Evgeniy
RUS0 0
Round 2 Match 27
Zhou,
Weiqi
CHN 0 0.0
Kamsky,
Gata
USA1 1
Round 2 Match 28
Vitiugov,
Nikita
RUS ½ 0.5
Milos,
Gilberto
BRA½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 29
Cheparinov,
Ivan
BUL ½ 0.5
Bologan,
Viktor
MDA½ 0.5
Round 2 Match 30
Naiditsch,
Arkadij
GER 1 1.0
Onischuk,
Alexander
USA0 0
Round 2 Match 31
Li,
Chao
CHN 0 0.0
Pelletier,
Yannick
SUI1 1
Round 2 Match 32
Polgar,
Judit
HUN ½ 0.5
Nisipeanu,
Liviu-Dieter
ROU½ 0.5


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PeterDoggers
Peter Doggers

Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms.

Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools.

Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013.

As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”

In October, Peter's first book The Chess Revolution will be published!


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