Hello dear chessfriends! After a little break we continue the annotations of the Dortmund Candidate tournament games. The fine weather is in Saint-Petersburg now and it looks all the people went to the sea. But the storm is above the Finnish bay now and seems something similar happens in Dortmund too. The unbeleiveable events happened in the last rounds of preliminary group tournaments and the cause of them was Morozevich. Seems the semi-finalists need to take a little pause and to come to themselves, so today the quiet struggle is probable. Let's see! So the semi-finals have begun. In these matches will be the four classical games and if it's necessary tie-break in rapid chess. I am sure that the true connoisseurs of the chess art are looking at the screens of their pcs now, trying to get the information from Dortmund. We are glad to help you to do it, so stay with us! Today are playing: Bareev-Topalov 0-1 Shirov-Leko 0-1 Yeah, already the first moves refute my suppositions about the quiet character of the struggle of the today's games. In the both games the hot struggle has begun! On my datas, Bareev played with Topalov not too many games - 11 (if to compare with Kasparov and Karpov of course), the result of those games +1 in favour of Bulgarian. But yesterday Topalov played the strange match with Shirov - to define the winner of their group (maybe it was simplier to throw lots?), so Bareev rested more. Though he has a lot of problems in the finish of group tournament. Benoni was played and it was not the surprise for Bareev because Bulgarian is known to be the expert of this variation and it's one of his main weapons against 1.d4. And Bareev is well prepared for this - he chose the sharp system with 7.f4, in his practice this variation met once in the far 1987 year. In this system the exact knowledge of the many complicated variants is necessary and taking into account some tiredness of Topalov, this psychological decision of Bareev looks promising. After 8.Bb5 the reply 8... Nfd7 is right, in case of 8...Bd7 or 8...Nbd7 after 9.e5! Black has the serious problems. 10...Na6 and 11...Nb4 - the most common continuation. The Knight-b4 presses on the position of White and makes the difficulties for the manoeuvres of white pieces. 12.h3 - a very rare move, only 5 games are in the Megabase 2002 (but I have to notice with good results for White). Taking under the control the g4-square White doesn't hurry to break in the center and regroups the forces quietly. The main moves here are - 12.Be3, 12.Re1, 12.Kh1, 12.Bd2. After 12...a6 13.Bc4 - of course it's stronger than 13.Be2 (the Bishop must to press on the center!) Re8 14.Re1 f5 15.ef5 gf5 16.Bc4 Nb6 17.Re8 Qe8 18.Bf1 Bd7 with counter-play at Black (Hort-Panno, Madrid 1973). 13...f5 - and this is the novelty. Though it looks rather risky: the square-e6 is weak now, and Bareev emphasizes that by 14.Ng5!? But Black can play so only then when White has no break e4-e5, because it was bad on the 12th move: 12...f5 13.e5! de5 14.Bd7 Bd7 15.fe5 and White has an advantage (Moskalenko-Fernandez, Spain 2000). 15...a5 - it doesn't look fine, the square-b5 is weak now forever, but, seems Topalov considered the threat a4-a5 very unpleasant. Though it was possible to play 15...c4, for example 16.a5 (16.Bc2) cb3 17.Qb3 Nd3 18.ab6 Bd4 19.Kh2 Qb6 with unclear play. 17.Kh1!? - a very composed move, Bareev considers that the e4-pawn can't be saved and he can make prophylactic move. Maybe he is right... The tactical sense - to avoid 17...c4 - then follows 18.Bb6 Qb6 19.Bc4. Another insinuating move - 19.Rab1!? the superfluous defence of the b2-pawn! - in case of immediate 19.Nge4 follows a very unpleasant 19...Nb2! Now White wants to beat out the support of the black Knight-d3 on the next movem Black has to look for the additional tactical resourses, maybe 19...c4? The position came to the crysis and can be defined on the closiest moves already. As we proposed the crysis happened in the game, but alas the results were not in favour of Bareev. Nevertheless the Knight-d3 is like the "splinter" in the White's position, apparently White should not allow to settle this Knight on such position. After forced play 19...Bf5 20.g4 h6 21.gf5 hg5 22.fg5 gf5 23.Rf5 Qd7 24.Rbf1 Re5! it was turned out that White loses the h3-pawn (the very pawn, which he moved on the 12th move, having directed the game into the original course). Bareev offered the Queen's exchange - 26.Qh2, with the tricky idea: 26...Qe3? 27.Rg7 Kg7 28.Qh6 Kg8 29.Qg6 with the perpetual check. But of course the players of such level guessed such ideas. In the ending Black, besides an extra-pawn, has the more active pieces, Topalov played simply and strong. 27...Rf8! - to exchange the active white Rook. Bareev could to put before the contenders the more difficult problems after 30.Ba2 (instead of 30.Bd1), for example 30...Nd7 31.Rf1 N7c5 32.Bc4 Nb2, but he was in the zeitnot. Of course it was necessary to exchange the Rooks and to try to make the draw in the opposite-colored Bishop's ending with an extra-pawn at Black - 33.Re5 de5 34.Bc5 Nc5 35.Kg3 etc., but Bareev still hoped to make some threat for black King. But 37...Bg5! 38.Re5 Be3 became the "cold shower" for White. Having given the exchange, Black liquidated the all threats and soon the all white pawns have fallen as the ripe nuts. When Black won the 4th pawn Bareev resigned. Yeah, we have to acknowledge that the strategy of Bareev was crashed today. He wanted to keep the contender on the distance and to get a comfort advantage without any counter-play at Black. Because of that appeared such moves as 17.Kh1, 19.Rab1 etc. But it happens in chess rarely. When the tactical battle began it was turned out that Black, under the cover of the strong Knight d3, got the advantage and led the game to the victory with the confidence. Shirov met with Leko more often - 28 times, the result is rather wonderful (we know Leko loses not often) +11 -2 in favour of Shirov (not taking into account the draws). So in this pair we expect the principal battle: attack and defence, ice and fire etc. And in this game the struggle is uncompromised! Was played the Cheliabinsk variation of Sicilian, in which both contenders are the experts: Shirov is on white side, Leko is on black. In group tornament Topalov in the game with Shirov played 10...Bg7 11.Bd3 Ne7, Leko prefers the another popular continuation - 10...f5. The contenders play very actual variation, the position after 17th move met in Megabase 30 times! 17...Qc8!? - a manyfunctional move, combines the defence of f5-pawn and the possibility of lunge on the c5-square and with the counter-play on "c"file. 18.Kh1!? - the new word in the theory of this variant, this move prepares the underminings f2-f3 or g2-g4. White tested 18.Bb3, 18.f3 or even immidiately 18.g4, but without any success. It's mistaken now 18...Nd5? 19.Be4!+- or 18...b4?! 19.cb4 Bb2 20.Re3! with an attack (Tseshkovsky-Krasenkov, Voskresensk 1992). 18...Rb8 - a logical novelty, while White is planning the operations in the center and on the K-side, Black organizes the counter-play on the Q-side. Before met 18...Re8 and 18...Ng6. 20.Nb1 - it is necessary to step back because in case of 20.cb4 Bb2 21.fe4 Ba3 the Bishop c2 is under attack and White has no time for mating attack. And now Black takes the c3-pawn, but Shirov found a strong reply: 22.Nc3 (desrved attention also 22.Re2) Qс3 23.fe4! Leko didn't rosk to take the Bishop, though it was possible: 23...Qc2 24.ef5 Rb2 25.Qg4 Ng6 26.fg6 hg6. Black prefered not to open the lines: 23...f4 24.Bb3 Ng6, relying on the strong Knight g6. The position of dynamical balance has appeared. It's very difficult for White to drive away the black Knight without weakening of his own K-side. 29.Rb4 (better 29.Rfc1) ab4 30.Bd1 - the beginig of the unsuccessful series of the moves, and now Black has got the initiative. After 33...Qe3 Black has simple play, his pieces penetrate in the contender's camp, and for White it's very difficult to find the objects for the counter-play. What has 2 problems: bad Bishop and poor position of his King, which is pursueded by black Queen. 37.Bh5 - Shirov is rushing in the desperate attack because he understand otherwise he'll lose slowly without any chances. But seems he has no perpetual check. Yeah, Shirov resigned, he didn't check Leko's technique though he could make several checks. For example: 48.Qg5 Kf7 49.Qf5 Ke7 50.Qe6 Kd8 51.Qd6 Kc8 52.Qc5 Kb7 53.Qb4 Ka8. The course of the game was not very logical. In the opening Leko used the novelty and after that was the equal position. And here Shirov started to make his position worse and worse and it has led him to the defeat. |
