Sadler does it again, wins Oslo Open with 8/9
(UPDATED) Matthew Sadler won the Oslo Open most convincingly on Sunday, finishing clear first with 8/9. The English grandmaster, who retired from professional chess over a decade ago, also won a strong open tournament in Barcelona in August. In Oslo he finished 1.5 points ahead of the rest of the field.
Matthew Sadler in Oslo | Photo © Tarjei J. Svensen for the official website
| Event | Oslo Open | PGN via TWIC |
| Dates | October 2nd-9th, 2011 |
| Location | Oslo, Norway |
| System | 9-round Swiss |
| Players | Sergei Tiviakov, Matthew Sadler, Sergei Volkov, Jon Ludvig Hammer, Kaido Kualots, Vladimir Burmakin, Sipke Ernst, Eduardas Rozentalis and others |
| Time control | 2 hours for the first 40 moves and then 1 hour to finish the game |
He did it again! Matthew Sadler was in a class of his own at the Oslo Open, scoring an impressive 8/9 in not such a weak field. 'Open tournament tiger' and former super-grandmaster Sergei Tiviakov was first seed, there were two more 2600-players (Sergei Volkov and Jon Ludvig Hammer) and experienced GMs like Vladimir Burmakin, Eduardas Rozentalis and Viktor Mikhalevski were also present.
Still, the English grandmaster only dropped two half points, against IM Danny Raznikov in the second round, and against Tiviakov in the 7th round. Besides weaker players, Sadler beat GMs Sipke Ernst, Viktor Mikhalevski and Sergei Volkov. Here are his nine games, which resulted in a 2860 performance rating:
[board]/drupal7/sites/default/files/games/oslo11/sadler2.pgn[/board]
Dutch GM Sipke Ernst played an excellent tournament too, finishing on sole second place with 6.5/9 and a 2649 performance. The third prize was shared between GMs Tiviakov, Mikhalevski, Burmakin and Rozentalis and IM Frode Elsness, who scored a GM norm.
After playing only in the Dutch league for years, Sadler now finished four serious tournaments. He won two weekenders in Haarlem in 2010 and 2011, he won a 10-round Swiss in August in Barcelona and now this one in Oslo. Maybe the organizers of the Tata Steel tournament should try to get him to Wijk aan Zee next January?
Update: apparently Matthew Sadler had already been invited to Wijk aan Zee in July, for the Grandmaster Group C, and accepted. In an article on Schaaksite.nl tournament director Jeroen van den Berg says he's (pleasantly) surprised about Sadler's recent results, and admits that he belongs in the B group. Since that group is already full, he'll 'have a chat' with Sadler about the situation.
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.”
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