Russian Superfinal: Svidler beats Morozevich, leads with Lastin
In the second round of the Russian Championship Superfinal Peter Svidler defeated first seed Alexander Morozevich with Black. Alexander Lastin also won again and joined him in the lead.At Moscow's Central Chess Club the Russian Championship Superfinal takes place from October 3 to 15. As mentioned in our first report, an ill Alexander Grischuk was replaced by Konstantin Sakaev.
Konstantin Sakaev, who replaces for the second year in a row
(last year Alekseev fell ill) | Photo: Mark Gluhovsky
[TABLE=414]After beating Inarkiev in the first round, Svidler had to play the theoretically most difficult game of the tournament: with Black against first seeded Morozevich. But as a successful keeper Svidler kept his goal clean, and actually scored himself.He was well prepared for Moro's English Opening and reached a satisfactory position after fifteen moves. After White missed the interesting possibility 29.d4!? Black's position became slightly better and the strong manoeuvre Nb4-c6-d4 increased that advantage. After some tactics, perhaps White should have tried 39.f6!? because soon he found himself playing with three pawns down.Then Black missed a much more easy win with 52...Rxd8 but still he could reach the famous Alekhine-Capablanca rook ending by force. With reversed colours, Morozevich defended differently than the great Cuban: he didn't us his king to stop the passed a-pawn and he didn't move his own h-pawn. This allowed Black to "freeze" his pawn structure with 66...g4! and after replying 71.f4!? with the strong 71...h4! it was over. If White just waits with 72.Kc3 then 72...h3 followed by Ke6-d6 and White's Kc4 can always be met with Re7.Lastin and Alekseev beat their opponents in fine positional style and like Maslak, poor Inarkiev suffered his second loss but this time after trying a nice and promising piece sacrifice. Do have a look at Inarkiev-Vitiugov after 38...Ng2 because this position looks just great. There, instead of running immediately, 39.Nxg2 hxg2 40.Rf2! is highly unclear.
Svidler, having a great start, here against
Inarkiev in round 1 | Photo: Mark Gluhovsky
A disappointing second-round game for Alexander
Morozevich | Photo: Mark Gluhovsky
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Peter Doggers is Chess.com’s Senior Global Correspondent. Between 2007 and 2013, his website ChessVibes was a major source for chess news and videos, acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
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