Batumi Olympiad

[Jonathan Rogers]

Saric v Caruana is of some interest; not just because the Croatian board one beat Carlsen in a previous Olympiad and stands better today, but also because he appears to be mimicking Carlsen's opening preferences. Come on Fabio, show us your prep! You owe it to your country!

[Jonathan Rogers]

Argentina v England: three of the games are going perfectly well from our point of view, but board three, where they stand better, shows the most marked advantage of them all. So starts a rather familiar "anything between 1.5-2.5 to 2.5-1.5" battle for England, which we can only hope will end up the way the Brazil match did. Even though we are playing without David Howell.

[Jonathan Rogers]

ah, Luke is trying (successfully) to attract our attention now.

Incidentally, has anyone explained what was going on in his game yesterday (ie, the mysterious 20...Nxe5 possibility urged by Stockfish, but without giving variations, apparently just to tease us)?

[Christopher Kreuzer]

It has gone pear-shaped on board two as well (for McShane). I don't think England are going to come back from this. On board 1, Adams has a game that has simplified into a drawn opposite-coloured bishops endgame. Questions will probably be asked as to why Howell was rested. Oh well.

[What is it about South American teams - Peru, Brazil, Argentina - do England do particularly badly against them?]

[Jonathan Rogers]

We did beat Chile in 1992. Actually, we did win that match against Brazil this year.

Shouldn't write off Luke just yet. Let's not be slaves to the engine. But he probably is trying to force his luck.

[Alexander Hardwick]

It has gone pear-shaped on board two as well (for McShane).

Can we be quite so sure? McShane has sacrificed his queen for 2 pieces and some pressure; the computer is always going to dislike such sacrifices, and we haven't really had enough moves since then to judge whether or not it's working out in practice (everything up to 14.Ne5 is basically entailed by the sacrifice).

[JustinHorton]

Whoops

[Mick Norris]

Navara - Gelfand not the best move 31 from Boris

[Christopher Kreuzer]

It has gone pear-shaped on board two as well (for McShane).

Can we be quite so sure? McShane has sacrificed his queen for 2 pieces and some pressure; the computer is always going to dislike such sacrifices, and we haven't really had enough moves since then to judge whether or not it's working out in practice (everything up to 14.Ne5 is basically entailed by the sacrifice).

I must confess I did do what Jonathan said (engine slave!) and only looked at the evaluation. It was only later that I realised that White's queen was not on the board... I am slightly more optimistic now.

[Roger de Coverly]

Whoops

That one again.

http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/Y ... 242158/5#5

It can be played both with d3 and d4. I was told by someone who had used the trap with success that Simon Williams had drawn attention to it.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Navara - Gelfand not the best move 31 from Boris

That is shocking.

[JustinHorton]

Poland have drawn both their Blacks

[Roger de Coverly]

It has gone pear-shaped on board two as well (for McShane).

Can we be quite so sure? McShane has sacrificed his queen for 2 pieces and some pressure; the computer is always going to dislike such sacrifices, and we haven't really had enough moves since then to judge whether or not it's working out in practice (everything up to 14.Ne5 is basically entailed by the sacrifice).

[SetUp "1"] [FEN "1r2k2r/1Pq1bppp/pp2pn2/4N3/5B2/N1P3P1/PP2pPBP/R3R1K1 b k - 4 15"]

They are at move 15 at the moment. The chessbomb stockfish would return the queen to end up with an extra pawn.
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 e6 3. g3 Nc6 4. Bg2 Nf6 5. d3 d5 6. Qe2 b6 7. O-O Bb7 8. Re1 Be7 9. Na3 a6 10. c3 c4 11. exd5 cxd3 12. dxc6 dxe2 13. cxb7 Rb8 14. Ne5 Qc7 15. Bf4 Bxa3 16. bxa3 Rxb7 17. Ng6 hxg6 18. Bxc7 Rxc7 19. a4 Nd7 20. Rab1 Rxc3 21. Rxe2

Engine analysis from 15. .. Bxa3 onwards

Luke didn't go for Mickey's calm idea a few days ago of deferring O-O in the interests of playing e5 and c4.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Black seems to have blundered (though the position is very complicated) and McShane (to whom I owe an apology!) will end up with rook and two bishops against Queen and two pawns. Hopefully those pawns won't become annoying. Both players low on time, but McShane ahead there as well.

[JustinHorton]

The US are cruising against Croatia so whether they catch up at the top depends on Duda-Mamedyarov (Black a bit better, the other three games drawn).