English Chess Forum

Leonard Barden suggested I comment on some of the above. 1) It is impossible to estimate with any accuracy how many chess games (including skittles and simuls) that Blackburne played in his long career; the figure of 70-80K quoted above is substantially higher than the figure in the introduction to ...

Vasiukov died today, aged 85. He will be missed at all the senior events he has been playing in recent years.
(He had in fact just been announced as Russia's board 3 in the World Senior Team Championships.)

https://chess24.com/en/read/news/evgeni ... dies-at-85

Paikidze offered a draw as soon as she saw the Wang result and Goletiani (who was slightly better but low on time) accepted. So tiebreak tomorrow. Caruana said in his interview that he thought +4 would be good enough for a tie. Even after losing in round 4 he still felt confident that he could win t...

Congratulations to Sam Shankland on a brilliant +6 to become US champion ahead of Caruana on +5.

Annie Wang is busted but may yet be champion if Goletiani holds Paikidze.

Shankland instantly responded 8 h3 and Liang is looking unprepared for that. 8.h3 was played by GM Demchenko in February, so it's hard to believe that Liang wasn't ready for it. Apparently he wasn't, 16 minutes on move 8 and 10...0-0-0 is a novelty. Maurice Ashley said he only found one game with 7...

Awonder Liang playing John Moore's suggestion (7... e5) against Sam Shankland in the Exchange Caro-Kann... Yasser Seirawan at first thought it was a fault on the DGT board but Shankland instantly responded 8 h3 and Liang is looking unprepared for that. I have 9 correspondence games in my database w...

I don't know for a fact but I believe in 2016 SHankland and Robson were selected on championship performances. Maybe it's just a weighting.

See http://mannchess.org.uk/Organisations/Leeds%20CC.htm More research is needed in my files. From a quick look: There certainly was, however briefly, a chess club in Leeds circa 1825 which started a correspondence match with a club newly established in Hull. (Manchester Guardian 17 Dec 1825 but no...

So here we go in about 20 minutes. https://chess24.com/en/watch/live-tournaments/us-championship-2018/11/1/1 Shankland (7.5) v Liang (4.5) Caruana (7) v Onishchuk (3) Who could have predicted before the event started that the last round pairing Wesley So (6) v Hikaru Nakamura (5) would be basically ...

Sam won after all, so tomorrow it's Shankland-Liang and Caruana-Onishchuk.
In each tournament the leader is half a point ahead of the only other possible champion.

Horrific collapse by Abrahamyan (when a pawn ahead) in time trouble so there will only be a half-point gap at the top in the women's.

Abrahamyan probably will miss out on the olympiad now.

Draw (fairly quick too) for Annie Wang who may even end the day as US Champion because Nazi Paikidze is struggling at 10pm BST. Yasser told her but she replied "She hasn't lost yet." What are you going to do now, he asked. "Go home, do my homework and go to bed." I have to take back my prediction th...

Draw for Wang to maintain her clear lead.
Wesley So draws his seventh game in a row.
Shankland in pole position to retake sole lead (but his game and Caruana's still in progress)

I nearly forgot to post today's line-ups. Caruana (5.5) v Nakamura (3.5) Shankland (5.5) v Zherebukh (4) Akobian (3.5) v So (5) Lenderman (4.5) v Robson (3.5) Izoria (4) v Onishchuk (2.5) Xiong (3.5) v Liang (3) Lenderman is in with a chance of snatching that reserve spot. He plays Xiong tomorrow an...

Well I agree she might be a risk: she has just won two lost positions but it proves she is a fighter.
I would tip Paikidze to beat Wang today but some crazy things have been happening.