Hello dear chess friends! Again the site "Russian chess" and leading Saint-Petersburg Grandmasters are working for you! By this transmission and annotation we continue our tradition to broadcast the greatest chess events of the year. And so today we are expected by the following games: Anand - Van Wely 1/2 Shirov - Ivanchuk 1/2 Grischuk - Karpov 1/2 Polgar - Timman 1-0 Radjabov - Topalov 0-1 Kramnik - Bareev 1-0 Krasenkow - Ponomariov 1/2 Of course the game Kramnik vs. Bareev is the game of the round (and maybe the game of all tournament!). Here a lot of things tied: leader of the tournament Bareev is playing with outsider(!!!)- the World Champion, besides Bareev is the coach of Kramnik... Vladimir will try to improve his situation in this event :). Rather cheerless variation of Caro Cann (B19) leads to the slightly worse for Black ending. The move 18...Nd6 came in to the modern practice recently - there are only 3 games in Base. Before that Black chose any continuations, but not this way. After 19.b3 there are already 2 games: Bondarchuk-Bets,Nikolaev 2001 - 19...Bf6 and Tirard-Fontaine,Hyeres 2001 - 19...b5. Both games were won by Black, but it does not mean anything essential. The slightly better ending in the Kramnik's hand is very "dreadful" weapon. Unexpectedly Bareev fell to thinking for a long time... Evgeny could not to make undermines succesfully - and the ending became even worse than I thought. After 22.Kc2 Bd8 the manoeuvre of the Knight on the f3-square with following jumping on e5 paralised Black! It's possible that the ending has technical character. After the trading on ╔5 Black has given the line d, but he has got the square d5 for the Knight. And after g4-g5 appeared the square f5 as well, where the Knight was transfered. Bkack almost has no moves - but position looks like fortress... if it would not be Kramnik! Vladomir transfered his King to the King-side and after 46.Bf6! he has cleared up the position. It is not possibl to take the Bishop because after Kg5, h5-h6 White wins easily. If not to take the Bishop then treathens Bf6-g7 and if Ng7 then h5-h6. But after chosen by Evgeny g7-g6 the fortress is broken. The games Anand vs. Van Wely and Grischuk vs. Karpov are very important from the point of view of tournament struggle - Anand and Karpov share 2-3 places. So we should not expect the short drawn games here... Anand - Van Wely In the well-known Cheliabinsk variation the contenders left the main line from the source game Beliavsky - Sveshnikov, Lvov 1978 (zt). The theoretical continuation is 18...Rg5. Further Sveshnikov played 24...Rc5, but Van Wely chose 24...Nb4. This move already met in the game Klovans - Timoschenko, Odessa 1975. White has got an extra-pawn after 25.А3 Nc2 26.Ba6 Bc4 27.Bc4 Rc4 28.g3, but Black has the draw by 28...Rca4 or 28..Raa4. - E. Sveshnikov. However all of sudden the game finished by draw - well today is not the day of Anand :) Umm... well here's nothing to annotate - again White didn't show any improvement in Cheliabinsk variation... Grischuk - Karpov It's already 3rd drawn variation in the leaders games. What do we have after caro Cann and Cheliabinsk? Right - Petroff defence! :) Very popular opening, very popular variation (C42), which, by the way, already met in the practice of both the contenders up to 21st move! And this variation appeared in 2002. For the first time: Anand-Karpov,Prague 2002 (1-0 !) Vishy played 21.Nh3, Grischuk followed him in the game Grischuk-Adams, Halkidiki 2002(1-0 !). Morovich Fernandez has learnt from Gelfand :), that there is the forced draw after 21.h5, he refused to play by this way and lost - Morovich-Gelfand,Cap de Agde 2002 (0-1), Movsesian didn't refuse already - Movsesian-Gelfand,Bled Ol 2002 (1/2). Although that's all about the statistics of this variation, but what a statistics! Alexander used the novelty - 21.Nf3 - the Knight is not going to attack the punkt g6, but the square f3 is so habitual ;) After the capture of the "e" line - 23.Re1, White has got some initiative, but there are not too many pieces on the board already... Grischuk tried to confuse the contender - but the Bishops were exchanged already... Though the Knight aimed to the f5-square, and black King has not good position on f8 so the initiative is still on the side of White. But Karpov is still the best defender - exchanged the Knights and Rooks - draw! The duel of the other World Champion (FIDE version) - Krasenkow vs. Ponomariov deserves intent attention as well. We don't have to be confused by the very solid opening - Queen indian. These fighters will struggle till the end! The variation 4.a3 (E12)- and after castling, white pawn h rushed along - usual play of Krasenkow - ahead to attack! And the move 13.e5 is as confirmation of this - White is going to attack the black king. And it happened in the position where are 15 (!) possible (and played) continuations. The move 14.h4 looks like the novelty. In reply Ponomariov chose "roundabout way" - 18...Bb4 - it is not clear what White has got from the opening... The most important is not to be mated on g7 :). And th Knight f8 is not good piece - while Black traded the Rooks, Krasenkow is preparing to the penetration on the King-side. Seems it was not good to play by Bishop on b4 because now Black has the difficulties with defence of his King. As result he has to trade the Queens on f5. Appeared the ╔6-square for Knight - but Black had to give the b6-pawn. Of course he has compensation for this but no more. In zeitnot Krasenkow lost the pawn and the 4 Bishop ending looks drawn.Mikhail could not get any profit from his passed pawns. Maybe to force Black to play on King-side?! Well it is a fantastic... 2 Bishops has one important pecularity - they can check ALL THE TIME.:) White is playing for a win, but Black is playing for a draw BETTER. :) Even Bg8 didn't help, in reply Ponomariov moved ahead the h-pawn and White has to give the f-pawn, and though he takes 2 black pawns, it can't help too because after forced play Black sacrificed the Bishop and the game comes to the theoretical draw. No doubt there will be interesting struggle in the game Shirov vs. Ivanchuk too. By the order of moves of "accelerated" Cheliabinsk variation 2...Nc6, 4...e5 (B32) (usual order - 4...Nf6 5.Nc3 e5) Ivanchuk let his contender to escape form Ural traps :) by the very rare 8.Nc4 (Alekhine-Galindo,1941 sim Madrid). Nobody used this continuation after Alekhine :)... Go away theory! Hello creative work! Just the position of White after such long trip of the Knight does not look good... White undermines the chain of black pawns of the Queen-side, black Knight-a5 is "in out". But the black pawns advance ahead in the center and the position becomes very sharp on 15th move already. Ivanchuk removed the Knight on b7 - he has good position. Black will play a5 and it looks Black has better chances. But he has time troubles and offered a draw and of course Shirov agreed. And so today it is one more victory of Sveshnikov system! Radjabov - Topalov Solid variation of Catalan E06-08 (from the Bogoljubov defence of Queen indian) did not promise such fierceful fighting. The youngest participant of the tournament chose this sharp way! And again something strange with opening - seems the variation very popular...the contenders made usual moves... and only after 10 moves it turn out that nobody played this way! 12.Rac1 - novelty! Usually Black played 12...Nh5, driving away the white Bishop (depriving White from e4), or White played ╔2-e4, without setting up the rooks on the "А" and "d" verticals. So White setted up the rooks and Black has prepared himself for А7-А5. And here suddenly after 12...Nh5 has White playd 13.e4?!! The note of interrogation - for spoiled pawn structure, the exclamation - for bravery! Topalov leads his 2nd Knight to the f4-square and takes the pawn, sicrificing the exchange on the Queen-side. The pawn and the Knight f4 is very good compensation! Black has strong initiative on the King-side. Radjabov tried to give back the exchange, removing the Rook on g3. Topalov did not agree with this, despite of that he could get the ending with extra pawn then... Topalov decided to play without exchange, but with the initiative, besides white pieces have passive position. Radjabov lost the pawn d4 - white King feels not good. The black Rook has got new squared for penetration. If nothing will happen then Veselin wins. The position of White became worse and worse - the end is coming. Topalov realized the advantage with confidence. Polgar - Timman Paulsen variation - another popular variation with penetration of the Knight on the b6-square (B46). And here too happened unusual way of play - 13...d5 practically nobody played this way before! Hundreds games were played by 13...А5, and 13... d5 - only 3! 14.ed cd 15.c4! - or it will be late! 14.Qd3?! a5 Lutz-Andersson,Leon 2001(1/2).15...0-0 (15...dc 16.Qa4 Qd7 17,Qd7 Nd7 18.Bc4 += Dolmatov-Tunik,2002 Ekateinburg 2002) 16.Rac1 - novelty! It looks stronger than met before 16.Be5 Rb6 17.Qd4 Bc5 18.Qh4 Ne4 with unclear struggle - Gallagher-Iuldashev,Sangli 2000. White has slightly better position - and further better ending is possible... After forced play, started by 21...Na4, Timman has got bad ending (as I thought) and moreover he lost after blunder 27...Qe5?? I'd like to note the move 24.Bc5! - where White could have the following - Rook+Bishop against Rook+Knight with the Queens. 24...Rd2 was impossible because of 25.Bf3 with following Be3 and taking the Knight ═4. In this game the rare variation has led to the full failure - Judith sorted out everything very well. And so, the 3rd round is finished. As result we have the following leading group: Bareev, Karpov, Anand and Polgar - all "+1". Kramnik and Topalov are very close - they are in big group "0". And outsider is Rajabov - "-2". All struggle is ahead. Take care! Best wishes! |
