Reykjavik Open March 10-18

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Barry Sandercock
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Barry Sandercock » Sat Mar 14, 2015 4:40 pm

Gawain Jones has an interesting game today against Tania Sachdev. I remember her at the British, winning the under 8 and under 10 Championships when she was 7 years old !

Richard Bates
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Richard Bates » Sat Mar 14, 2015 5:06 pm

Barry Sandercock wrote:Gawain Jones has an interesting game today against Tania Sachdev. I remember her at the British, winning the under 8 and under 10 Championships when she was 7 years old !
I remember her losing to my sister ;)

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MJMcCready
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by MJMcCready » Sat Mar 14, 2015 6:39 pm

It was a strange game. The early g-pawn push came back to haunt her in the end.

Martin Crichton
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Martin Crichton » Sat Mar 14, 2015 7:03 pm

Jon Victor (Only a 2400 IM and 48th seed) on the way to 5.5/6 - and 3.5/4 against average 2650 GMS

rating performance approaching 2900!

forget GM norm...the way he is playing I think he might win the tournament!
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Martin Crichton
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Martin Crichton » Sat Mar 14, 2015 7:58 pm

???? 54... Rc7 looks like a simple win... I dont understand why he repeated the position??? 3 times?

a patzer like me could win that position blindfolded
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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Sun Mar 15, 2015 12:22 am

That was a really strange game:

Melkumyan, Hrant - Gunnarsson, Jon Viktor
½-½
Reykjavik Open 2015 round 06



White was clearly winning, then blundered a piece. Black was then clearly winning (a whole rook up!) and repeated the position for no good reason. A real piece of tragicomedy.

EDIT: Line starting 27.e4 inserted, but what happens after 28...Qg7 instead of 28...Qh6? I know an engine could tell me, but am trying to work it out myself (not that I tried to work out why 27.h4 was not very good and what the best move was (27.e4), which kind of defeats the point of trying to work out these positions yourself without a watching engine.)
Last edited by Christopher Kreuzer on Sun Mar 15, 2015 10:12 am, edited 1 time in total.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sun Mar 15, 2015 1:11 am

Christopher Kreuzer wrote: Black was then clearly winning (a whole rook up!) and repeated the position for no good reason. A real piece of tragicomedy.
You have to suppose he saw a ghost or couldn't work it out on the increment. It's the game Martin Cr was mentioning. His Rc7 suggestion appears to be amongst the many moves that preserve a serious advantage.

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Sun Mar 15, 2015 10:06 am

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Christopher Kreuzer wrote: Black was then clearly winning (a whole rook up!) and repeated the position for no good reason. A real piece of tragicomedy.
You have to suppose he saw a ghost or couldn't work it out on the increment. It's the game Martin Cr was mentioning. His Rc7 suggestion appears to be amongst the many moves that preserve a serious advantage.
The other thing is that the winning advantage White had was not easy to calculate, thought I would have expected a GM of Melkumyan's standard to work it out. It starts 27.e4 instead of 27.h4. White has two pieces and three pawns for two rooks! A strange material balance, but the rooks are curiously ineffectual and end up being lost, first for the bishop to avoid mate and then to stop one of the pawns queening once it reaches e7. This leaves White a knight and pawn up in a winning endgame. I'll put the line (from the Chessbomb engine) in the game above.

As for Gunnarsson repeating at the end, he had 3 minutes to his opponent's 23 minutes, but that should have been enough. If he had less than a minute, I'd understand. Maybe he was repeating to gain time on the clock with the increment and miscounted the repetitions? An expensive miscalculation if so.

Brian Towers
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Brian Towers » Sun Mar 15, 2015 11:33 am

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:The other thing is that the winning advantage White had was not easy to calculate, thought I would have expected a GM of Melkumyan's standard to work it out. It starts 27.e4 instead of 27.h4. White has two pieces and three pawns for two rooks! A strange material balance, but the rooks are curiously ineffectual and end up being lost, first for the bishop to avoid mate and then to stop one of the pawns queening once it reaches e7. This leaves White a knight and pawn up in a winning endgame. I'll put the line (from the Chessbomb engine) in the game above.
He may have missed that his Qa8 stops the otherwise winning Qe4+ about a dozen moves in to the calculation. Those backward bishop moves are often hard to spot even at closer range.
Ah, but I was so much older then. I'm younger than that now.

Barry Sandercock
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Barry Sandercock » Sun Mar 15, 2015 4:46 pm

Another interesting game by Gawain Jones. On move nine he offers the g pawn, but Wang doesn't take it. The computer doesn't show why. maybe because it would open the g file on his king ?

Roger de Coverly
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sun Mar 15, 2015 5:03 pm

Barry Sandercock wrote: The computer doesn't show why. maybe because it would open the g file on his king ?
Allowing Nd4 with tempo looks a serious problem as well.

*

It appears to be new ground, previous players reaching that position had played 9. d4 although Gawain himself gave 9. d3 a try when White.

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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by David Robertson » Sun Mar 15, 2015 5:27 pm

It's raining miniatures. Sunday after the night before?

What's happened to Shake-Yo-Mammy in his game with Friendly Erwin? (1-0, 21; but Mamedyarov is up the exchange when he turns it in).

And to Stefannson v. Granda Zuniga (Caro-Kann; 0-1, 18). Looks like W forgot his move order at move 14, awkward when you've just sac'd a lump.

And to Idani v. Edvardsson (1-0, 21) where B just brain-fails an entire piece in the manner of the Little Piddling & District Div 3

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MJMcCready
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by MJMcCready » Sun Mar 15, 2015 6:10 pm

Barry Sandercock wrote:Another interesting game by Gawain Jones. On move nine he offers the g pawn, but Wang doesn't take it. The computer doesn't show why. maybe because it would open the g file on his king ?
And 28 Kg2 wasn't the best move.

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MJMcCready
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by MJMcCready » Sun Mar 15, 2015 6:19 pm

David Robertson wrote:It's raining miniatures. Sunday after the night before?

What's happened to Shake-Yo-Mammy in his game with Friendly Erwin? (1-0, 21; but Mamedyarov is up the exchange when he turns it in).

I think the problem is how to stop Nd5/Ne4 on white's next move.

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: Reykjavik Open March 10-18

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Mon Mar 16, 2015 7:25 pm

After the early setback, Gawain Jones has won four games in a row to get back up to the top boards. Will be on 6.5/8 and tied for second with two rounds still to go (10-round tournament). Dan Bisby got a draw against a GM yesterday, and is playing another GM today. Must be back on track for a norm of some sort, hopefully. Oh, and Alan Byron beat Carlsen in round 6 (no, not that Carlsen!). :mrgreen: