Mamedyarov Cruises; Nepomniachtchi, Giri Win In 'Kramnik Style'

Three players took home the full point at the Tal Memorial today. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov ruthlessly refuted over-optimistic play from Boris Gelfand, whereas Anish Giri and Ian Nepomniachtchi won in Kramnik-style, the latter against Vladimir Kramnik himself.

In the best round so far, the Moscow super-tournament saw three winners at the end of a long day. Mamedyarov's win came first, and it looked like an easy game for the Azerbaijani.

The game can be seen as a textbook example of a player going for material while neglecting his development, but there's more to it obviously. Gelfand surely knew that 19...Qxb2 was dangerous, and he must have taken 20.e6 into account. Perhaps he simply underestimated White's attack. It was surprisingly fast...

A smooth win for Mamedyarov. | Photo Eteri Kublashvili.

Both Nepomniachtchi and Giri won in "Kramnik style" today. "Nepo" followed the "classical Kramnik," who likes to fianchetto his king's bishop as White and play for a small advantage while keeping dynamic piece play.

As commentator GM Robert Hess writes, it appeared that Nepomniachtchi was looking to outplay his opponent (Kramnik!) rather than out-prepare him (which is virtually impossible against this opponent). Outplaying the 14th world champion isn't easy either, but a Nepomniachtchi in form can do it!

The third winner of the day was Giri, who followed the "modern Kramnik." That involved playing the London System, which has become extremely popular at top level—a trend Kramnik played a big role in. 

Whereas the London System was always a bit of an opening for club players (unless your name was Gata Kamsky), trading queens with 27.Qb5 certainly wasn't a club player's move. Did White really have anything there, besides a small space advantage? And how on earth do you exploit that?

Kramnik could perhaps do it, but in fact Giri showed himself a true master of the position. His trade on move 43 was instructive, and the remainder of the game as well.

"I feel like Giri has been trying to win a game like this for two years," was how Sam Copeland put it.

Today was Giri's day.

A full point after almost seven hours of play. | Photo Eteri Kublashvili.

The two drawn games were not bad either. Especially Levon Aronian vs Peter Svidler was exciting. Black got into time pressure in a sharp Grünfeld with opposite castling.

As Svidler explained in the post-mortem, he spent a half-hour twice to get himself acquainted with all the move-order intricacies. He would have liked to get back at least one of those half-hours later in the game! It was all the more impressive that he managed to hold on.

Here's Svidler explaining his game with commentator GM Evgeny Miroshnichenko (courtesy ChessCast).

And then there was Li Chao vs Vishy Anand, a Nimzo-Indian where the Chinese grandmaster played inaccurately but then found just enough counterplay to compensate for the loss of a pawn. "It's close for White. Sometimes the tactics just work by one move," said Anand.

Here are the players explaining their game (courtesy ChessCast).

2016 Tal Memorial | Round 3 Standings

The pairings for the fourth round on Friday, are Kramnik vs Anand, Gelfand vs Li Chao, Tomashevsky vs Mamedyarov, Svidler vs Giri, and Nepomniachtchi vs Aronian.