Sveshnikov challenges Shirov

[Chris Rice]

It appears Shirov has been running scared of a match against Sveshnikov for the last 22 years! According to this article Sveshnikov is really up for it. This Latvian grudge match is over 6 games and starts tomorrow.

http://chess-news.ru/en/node/16751

[Martin Crichton]

2-0 to Shirov but the 2nd game was in the balance for a long time and indeed I thought Sveshnikov was winning at various points but he is far too slow on the clock

[Martin Crichton]

game 3 Shirov missed 40 Rd3 trapping the black queen (with 20 minutes on his clock v his opponents 38 seconds)

As Ben Purton showed last week these 2700's are perhaps overrated

once you get in that club they mostly play amongst themselves ... not many play in open tournaments

[Martin Crichton]

looks like Shirov seen his blunder immediately afterwards he was furious with himself after the game but he still won

[Chris Rice]

3.5-0.5 to Shirov so far. From the ChessBase report it appears that Sveshnikov is more than a match for Shirov in the opening but, as Martin says above, he is a bit too slow so I guess age has undone most of the good work (he's 64 and Shirov is 42). Good match nonetheless and in his trademark opening in Game 2 he so nearly won. http://en.chessbase.com/post/shirov-sve ... tch-starts

[Chris Rice]

Shirov stuffed Sveshnikov 5.5-0.5 in the end http://en.chessbase.com/post/shirov-ove ... with-5-5-6

[John Foley]

Andrew Martin has posted analysis of one of Shirov's wins as black. http://youtu.be/11qn9hap6LM

Sveshnikov famously objected to people using his game scoresheet unless for a fee - challenging the notion that there could not be copyright in chess. I trust Andrew chipped in a few Euros.