Media comments on chess

[Nick Ivell]

I had always wondered how good Rachel Reeves was (at chess. I like her politically.)

Today I found out. Annotated game in the Telegraph.

The answer? She's pretty good! Even though the opposition was dire, I can tell she has some positional sense.

Let's hope she has some economic sense when she becomes Chancellor!

[Ian Thompson]

I had always wondered how good Rachel Reeves was (at chess. I like her politically.)

She played a few games in the 4NCL for North West Eagles in 1995, scoring 2/6. This is her win:

[Event "4NCL 9495"] [Date "1995.03.19"] [Round "10.8"] [White "Reeves, Rachel"] [Black "Cast, Abigail"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "C02"] [BlackElo "1720"] [WhiteTeam "North West Eagles"] [BlackTeam "South Wales Dragons"] 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 c5 4. c3 Nc6 5. Nf3 Qb6 6. a3 cxd4 7. cxd4 Bd7 8. Be2 Rc8 9. O-O Nge7 10. b4 Nf5 11. Be3 a6 12. Qd3 Na7 13. Nc3 h5 14. Bd1 Nb5 15. Na4 Qd8 16. Nc5 Bxc5 17. bxc5 b6 18. a4 Nbxd4 19. Nxd4 Nxd4 20. Qxd4 bxc5 21. Qf4 c4 22. Qg5 Qxg5 23. Bxg5 d4 24. Rc1 d3 25. Bd2 g6 26. Re1 O-O 27. Re4 Rfd8 28. Rexc4 Rxc4 29. Rxc4 Be8 30. Bc3 Rb8 31. Rb4 Rc8 32. Bd2 Kg7 33. Kf1 Rc5 34. f4 Rc8 35. Rd4 Rb8 36. Rxd3 Rb1 37. Ke2 Ra1 38. Rd4 Ra2 39. Kd3 Bc6 40. g3 Ra1 41. Ke2 Ra2 42. Rc4 Be8 43. Kd3 Ra1 44. Rc1 Ra3+ 45. Bc3 Ra2 46. Bc2 Bc6 47. a5 Bd5 48. Kd4 Kh6 49. Kc5 Ra3 50. Bd3 Ra2 51. Rc2 Ra3 52. Bxa6 Be4 53. Kb4 Rxa5 54. Kxa5 Bxc2 55. Kb6 g5 56. Bd2 gxf4 57. Bxf4+ Kg6 58. Kc6 f6 59. Kd6 fxe5 60. Kxe5 Bf5 61. Bc4 Kf7 62. Bg5 Bg4 63. Bd3 Kg7 64. Kf4 Kf7 65. Bh4 Bh3 66. Kg5 Bg2 67. Bg6+ Kg7 68. Bxh5 e5 69. Kf5 e4 70. Bg5 Kh7 71. Bg6+ Kg7 72. Be8 Kf8 73. Bc6 Bh3+ 74. Kf4 1-0

[Nick Ivell]

Thanks for posting that game, which gives ample evidence that Rachel knows how to handle herself on the White side of the Advanced (I really don't like 6....PxP).

[Tim Spanton]

I had always wondered how good Rachel Reeves was (at chess. I like her politically.)

Today I found out. Annotated game in the Telegraph.

The answer? She's pretty good! Even though the opposition was dire, I can tell she has some positional sense.

Let's hope she has some economic sense when she becomes Chancellor!

She seems to have had a grade of 129 in 1997

[Kevin Thurlow]

advert on youtube - for "first rollable e-chessboard"

https://squareoffnow.com/product/pro?ut ... cNEALw_wcB

[Geoff Chandler]

On today's Pointless chess openings was a theme. They listed 5 (two were bogus) and the contestants had to get the two that nobody knew (scored zero) to increase the prize fund by £500. The Scotch Game and Monkeys Bum were the two pointless answers. In explaining the Monkeys Bum the lad in the chair said it was an idea from Nigel Povah. The other genuine opening was the Evans Gambit which scored one point. (one person in a 100 knew it was a chess opening.)

[Tim Spanton]

On today's Pointless chess openings was a theme. They listed 5 (two were bogus) and the contestants had to get the two that nobody knew (scored zero) to increase the prize fund by £500. The Scotch Game and Monkeys Bum were the two pointless answers. In explaining the Monkeys Bum the lad in the chair said it was an idea from Nigel Povah. The other genuine opening was the Evans Gambit which scored one point. (one person in a 100 knew it was a chess opening.)

As a rule-of-thumb, every 100 people includes one saddo

[Ian Thompson]

On today's Pointless chess openings was a theme. They listed 5 (two were bogus) and the contestants had to get the two that nobody knew (scored zero) to increase the prize fund by £500. The Scotch Game and Monkeys Bum were the two pointless answers. In explaining the Monkeys Bum the lad in the chair said it was an idea from Nigel Povah. The other genuine opening was the Evans Gambit which scored one point. (one person in a 100 knew it was a chess opening.)

Pointless.jpg (240.24 KiB) Viewed 2575 times

Bird's Opening scored 1 point.

The presenter said Ken Coates had said "if that works then I'm a monkey's bum" to give that opening its name. Wikipedia may be their source.

[Stewart Reuben]

Just caught up with an article in the SUNDAY TIMES magazine called 'GAME OVER' by Ralph Jones.It is quite substantial, covering 6 pages.
It is mostly about cheating at chess involving computers. At the end it touches on the problem of the tendency at the top of games, particularly in the World Championship, ending in draws. Nothing new, but well-researched. although I am surprised that their chess correspondent, David Howell, is not quoted.
Snooker also suffers from the problem that the players are getting too good. They quite often have the problem of what is effectively a draw by repetition. Then they have a re-rack. I suspect that sometimes the players are encouraged to play more riskily, or come to a private agreement before play starts. Of course, all frames have to conclude with one of the players winning eventually.
CHESS 960 (Fischer-random) could help solve the problem of staleness at the top. Let us say it is a 20 game match. The admin chooses 10 different set-ups of the original position. The players play one game with white and one with black in each set. Presumably the percentage of arid draws would go down sharply.
First the very best computer would have to be used to weed out positions which favour white too much. To make Chess 960 more popular, a rating system is needed. That would need substantial prizes in order to encourage tournaments. Currently there are too few games played to establish a rating system.

[Kevin Thurlow]

Pointless - "Taylor's Joy" is quite a inventive wrong answer. Someone will doubtless now use it...

[Matt Mackenzie]

I had always wondered how good Rachel Reeves was (at chess. I like her politically.)

Today I found out. Annotated game in the Telegraph.

The answer? She's pretty good! Even though the opposition was dire, I can tell she has some positional sense.

Let's hope she has some economic sense when she becomes Chancellor!

She seems to have had a grade of 129 in 1997

Her younger sister Ellie (now a fellow Labour MP) also played a bit but was somewhat weaker.

[Nick Ivell]

I don't follow Labour politics very closely. I had no idea Ellie was an MP.

[Ian Thompson]

There's a letter in today's Guardian on the "king of chess writers".

[Paul Habershon]

I normally ignore the Business pages in 'The Times', but I noticed chess in a headline today. World Chess, which owns the online gaming rights of FIDE, has been listed in London with a value of £41.7 million. I hope this link isn't stymied by a paywall
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/worl ... -k9xdlfbwg

The article does perpetuate the 600 million active players assertion, which I think the Forum has rejected as mythical.

[Roger de Coverly]

II hope this link isn't stymied by a paywall

It is, but these aren't.

https://www.londonstockexchange.com/dis ... ain-market
ttps://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/companies/ ... 11498.html

There's also
https://www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk/co ... 95284.html

Also https://www.londonstockexchange.com/new ... t/15670019
which seems to have escaped the forum's notice.

In it there is a statement

The global online chess market remains relatively undeveloped as a share of the estimated 600 million adult players globally*, but monthly traffic to chess websites grew by as much as 75% at the end of H1 of 2020 compared to the end of 2019*. Chess gaming has also seen strong growth on Twitch.com, a global streaming platform, where broadcast hours of chess increased by 150% in the past year.

*A 2012 study by YouGov indicated that more than 600 million adults play chess regularly, and at least 70% of the adult population of countries including US, UK, Germany, Russia, and India have played chess at some point during their lives 6.

**Playmagnus Annual Report of 2019

I think research showed that YouGov didn't really say that. Even if it did, nothing in the eleven years since has demonstrated the reliability of the estimate.