Vachier-Lagrave wins Univé Crown Group
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave won the Crown Group of the Univé Chess Tournament. The French grandmaster finished on 4.5/6 on Saturday, undefeated and a full point ahead of Alexei Shirov. Like last year Anish Giri scored fifty per cent while 2009 winner Sergei Tiviakov finished last with 1/6.Tournament winner Maxime Vachier-Lagrave | Photo © Fred LucasGeneral info
The 14th Univé Chess Tournament took place October 22-30 in Hoogeveen, The Netherlands. The Crown Group had Alexei Shirov, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Anish Giri and Sergei Tiviakov playing a double round-robin of six rounds. As always the venue was the town hall of Hoogeveen, where several amateur tournaments and a strong open are held alongside.Rounds 4-6
After three rounds Shirov and Vachier-Lagrave were sharing the lead with 2/3, and so their mutual encounter could be of crucial importance. The two met in round 4 and the Frenchman won a great game with the black pieces in a Gruenfeld. Vachier said he "probably made some calculating errors", but in any case Shirov couldn't profit from it.In an Accelarated Dragon Anish Giri defeated Sergei Tiviakov, who started to defend well only when he had little time left, according to Giri. "But it wasn't easy for him. Basically all he can do is wait." Interestingly - and here were quote the round report on the official website, just as we did above - about the Maroczy, Giri said that he "couldn't imagine Tiviakov would be aware of the latest developments". Possible, but of course Tivi has been playing that opening for decades...In round 5 Vachier-Lagrave won yet again, inflicting the 4th consecutive loss upon Tiviakov. However, according to the official website, after the game the Dutch grandmaster praised his opponent for playing almost flawlessly. In the same round Giri was crushed by Shirov in a kingside attack, after allowing a double pawn sacrifice. In the last round both Giri-Vachier and Tiviakov-Shirov were more or less balanced games that ended in a draw.Later this week more from Hoogeveen, with a special report on the Open group by IM Robert Ris.Games rounds 4-6
Game viewer by ChessTempo
The playing hall in Hoogeveen
Shirov vs Giri in round 5
Vachier vs Tiviakov in the same round
Sergei Tiviakov in what was not one of his best tournaments
Anish Giri, again finishing on 50%
Alexei Shirov, with a reasonable result between the European Club Cup and the Tal Memorial
Vachier-Lagrave, yet another World Junior Champion winning in Hoogeveen
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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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