Croatia Grand Chess Tour Event in Zagreb

[Nick Grey]

I still fancy Carlsen on 2/3.
Ice cold tap water.
9am cold brew coffee before it gets too hot for chess or watching cricket.

[John McKenna]

Nepo won quickly, Giri & So didn't apply themselves much, Carlsen had to try hard for the draw and all other games drawn, too. The players may have been perspiring more than they were inspiring.

[David Robertson]

Carlsen - Mamedyarov It's becoming silly. Just look at it after #8. How do you teach kids based on this stuff? If you saw a junior playing like this - like Carlsen - you'd settle them down, and explain: "develop your Bs before your Rs". If you saw it in Div 4 of the Little Piddling & District CL, you'd roll your eyes, and smile benignly at the duffer playing it

[Roger de Coverly]

How do you teach kids based on this stuff?

Julian Hodgson would play in this style thirty years ago. More recently meeting .. g6 with h4 is popular with Simon Williams. Attempting to exploit the absence of the Knight from f6 by playing an early h4 has been experimented with in the Grunfeld.

[Leonard Barden]

Carlsen - Mamedyarov It's becoming silly. Just look at it after #8. How do you teach kids based on this stuff? If you saw a junior playing like this - like Carlsen - you'd settle them down, and explain: "develop your Bs before your Rs". If you saw it in Div 4 of the Little Piddling & District CL, you'd roll your eyes, and smile benignly at the duffer playing it

No it isn't silly, the idea of h4-h5 here is quite normal.

http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?node=2521304

Look at the big plus for White and that the solid Ding Liren has played this system twice. Magnus's only novelty, which judging from his long think was found at the board, was 8 Rb1 in place of 8 g3.

The real lesson for juniors and Div 4 is that against this kind of Harry the h pawn/light square strategy you have to play actively. Shak's Nxc3, b6 and Bb7 are all slow/dubious, risking king safety.

(edit) well....maybe 13 Qg4? shows Div 4 you should develop Bs before Qs.....

[Nick Grey]

I thought Magnus was winning. h4 v g6 standard hack in many of my white lines. Qg4 looks like an error. I am assuming very hot again.

[Leonard Barden]

Starting with 13 Qg4? Magnus is doing his best to prove the correctness of the Prof's comment above....

[David Robertson]

He's going to wish he'd developed his Bs, I'm telling you. This looks pretty ropey at #16

I'll give a thoughtful, and serious, response to Leonard's comment on my wilfully provocative earlier post a little later

[heh, our posts crossed. Just seen LB's new one]

[Nick Grey]

Bc4 earlier may have been more to the point.

[LawrenceCooper]

Six draws in round 4.

[LawrenceCooper]

Five wins in round 6. Carlsen, Nepo & So joint leaders on 4.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Nepo has been a bit of a bogey player for the champ, very much not the case today however.

[Roger de Coverly]

Nepo has been a bit of a bogey player for the champ, very much not the case today however.

[SetUp "1"] [FEN "1r3r1k/4q1b1/3p3p/1p1B1ppP/2p1PpP1/3P1P2/QPP2K2/3R1R2 w - f6 0 28"]

The Stockfish at the chessbomb site seems to think that exf5 should be played, not fearing the consequences of .. Qe3 or .. Bd4

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Nc3 e5 4. Bc4 g6 5. d3 h6 6. h4 d6 7. h5 g5 8. Nh2 Bg7 9. Ng4 Nge7 10. Ne3 O-O 11. Bd2 Kh8 12. g4 Rb8 13. a4 Nd4 14. Ncd5 Nxd5 15. Nxd5 Ne6 16. f3 Nf4 17. Qb1 Be6 18. Qa2 Qd7 19. Rg1 b6 20. Bc3 Bxd5 21. Bxd5 a6 22. Bd2 Qe7 23. Rf1 b5 24. axb5 axb5 25. Kf2 c4 26. Bxf4 exf4 27. Rad1 f5 28. gxf5 g4 29. d4 Qh4+ 30. Ke2 Qh2+ 31. Rf2 gxf3+ 0-1

[Paul Cooksey]

Magnus was interviewed on the stream he missed 28 ef5 bd4 29 kg2 qe2 30 kh3 when things remain unclear, thinking only kh1 was possible. He said he might not have played it if he had seen it, so was sort of bluffing, in his own words. Nepo had seen the king could hide on h3 but miscalculated the game line.

[Jonathan Rogers]

6/8, winning smoothly enough today with black against perhaps his most challenging opponent. When he was on "just" 3/5 a few days ago, I recalled with a smile Leonard discussing his target being between 8-9/11 in such a strong field, but 8 indeed looks like the minimum score now.