6/13/2013 – The young Italian outplayed the World Champion quite easily, Carlsen exploited some strange endgame decisions by Kramnik to also take the full point. Nakamura had trouble after the opening in finding a plan and Mamedyarov capitalized easily. Morozevich and Karjakin held easy draws with black. Standings, GM commentary and pictures.
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The Eighth International Tal Memorial Chess Tournament is being held from
June, 13 to 24, 2013, with a rest day on June 16. The rounds generally start
at 15:00h (=3 p.m.) Moscow time, with the first round starting at 6 p.m.
and the final round at 1 p.m. Accommodation is in the Ritz-Carlton, Moscow,
Tverskaya str. 3, while the event takes place in the in New Technologies
Center Digital October, Bersenevskaya Embankment 6, in Moscow. The tournament
has ten invited players and is a round robin with time controls of one hour
and 40 minutes for the first 40 moves, followed by 50 minutes for next 20
moves and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game, with an increment of
30 seconds for each move starting from move one. Full information on special
rules, regulation, prize money, etc. can be found in our
initial report.
Round one report
Round 01 – June 13 2013, 15:00h
Dmitry Andreikin
2713
½-½
Alexander Morozevich
2760
Vishy Anand
2786
0-1
Fabiano Caruana
2774
Boris Gelfand
2755
½-½
Sergey Karjakin
2782
Magnus Carlsen
2864
1-0
Vladimir Kramnik
2803
Hikaru Nakamura
2784
0-1
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov
2753
ex-World Women's Champion Alexandra Kosteniuk graced the tournament with her presence.
Andreikin, Dmitry - Morozevich, Alexander ½-½
Morozevich is as unpredictable as ever! He opted for the Dragon variation of the Sicilian, against which Andreikin used a variation that had some popularity about a decade ago but is not considered critical anymore. Despite winning a pawn soon after entering the rook endgame, White's advantage was very slim due to his bad queenside pawn structure and the off-place rook on the h-file. Moro held the draw without problems in a well played game.
Gelfand, Boris - Karjakin, Sergey ½-½
Gelfand's Catalan was neutralized too easily and Karjakin had no problems forcing a draw early in the game. Last year many grandmasters made the comment that Gelfand's repertoire with black didn't have any problems, but that his white openings simply had no kick to them. Gelfand will have to improve this variation if he wants to repeat it in the tournament.
Caruana simply outplayed the World Champion today, and continues to approach the 2800 mark.
Anand, Viswanathan - Caruana, Fabiano 0-1
Caruana played a very aggressive opening in the style of the Marshall attack of the Spanish by giving up his pawn on e5 for active play. Anand declined Caruana's first sacrficie, but then the Italian insisted and sacrificed his a-pawn to obtain the bishop pair and a very active position. Anand was forced to accept and Caruana had enough compensation for the full pawn. When Anand allowed him to recover the pawn, Black was simply better with well placed pieces and a strong bishop on b7 that had no counter. A series of bad moves allowed Caruana to win two pawns, and the game was basically over for the World Champion.
Nakamura was gracious to provide commentary after the game, despite it not going his way.
Nakamura, Hikaru - Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar 0-1
Nakamura chose a relatively quiet variation against the Ragozin, but Mamedyarov was able to neutralize it and obtained a comfortable equality. The followup from the American was definitely not the best, and within a few moves he had very uncomfortable position. His position deteriorated to a point where after 18...Neg4! it was difficult to find a move for him. 19.h3? allowed Black to sacrifice a piece for a devastating attack, and Mamedyarov brought home the full point without missing a beat.
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1.d4Nf62.c4e63.Nf3d54.Nc3Bb45.Qa4+This move forces Nc6, which
means that Black will no longer have the possibility of breaking the center
with an early c5.Nc66.e30-07.Bd2dxc48.Bxc4a69.0-09.Qc2Bd610.a3!?with the idea of meeting e5 with d5.9...Bd610.Rad1e5if Black
can achieve this without any inconveniences, he has probably solved most of
his opening problems.11.dxe5Nxe512.Be2Qe713.Ng5A hard move to
understand. Maybe Hikaru wanted to trade some pieces on e4, which would have
put the d6 bishop in an uncomfortable position.Bf5!14.e4preventing
White's idea.14.Nge4?Nxe415.Nxe4b5!16.Qc2Rae8and the pin
is very uncomfortable.14...Bd715.Qc2h616.Nf3White's maneuvers have
accomplished less than Black's. Mamedyarov holds a slight advantage as his
position is more pleasant in almost every way.Rfe817.Rfe1Rad818.g3?
the start of some serious problems.18.h3Nxf3+19.Bxf3Qe520.g3is ok
for White since afterBxh3?!21.Bf4Qe622.e5only Black can get into
serious problems.18...Neg419.h3forcing Nxf2 which, unfortunately for
White, works quite well.Nxf220.Kxf2Bxh321.Kg121.Nd4Bc522.Be3Qe5
is hopeless for White since the knight cannot move nor be sufficiently
defended.21...Bxg322.Bf1Bxe123.Rxe1Black's superior in Material,
but more importantly White's king is wide open and the attack has not stopped.Bg424.Bg2Bxf3!Notice how important it was to trade the bishop for the
knight, as knights are known to be fantastic defenders.25.Bxf3Qd626.Re2Qg3+27.Bg2Ng428.Nd1Re629.Ne3Rc630.Qb1Qh2+31.Kf1Qf4+A swift
victory by Mamedyarov.0–1
"Did you set the clocks right?!" - Being the arbiter of such a high profile tournament must be stressful.
Mamedyarov's Ragozin passed the test of fire, Carlsen is watchful of his opponent's openings.
Carlsen, Magnus - Kramnik, Vladimir 1-0
Continuing with the tradition of playing any opening he desires and then winning anyways, Carlsen chose the Trompowsky variation against Kramnik. The Russian's response was unorthodox to say the least and an unusual position arose, in which Black had the pair of bishops but an awkward pawn structure. The endgame which arose definitely favored White due to the superior pawn structure, but it all pointed towards Kramnik being able to hold it without an issue. Kramnik gave away one of his pawns to obtain counterplay with a passed pawn. This decision was fine, but was inexplicable was his giving up the h-pawn for White's f-pawn, which gave White two passed pawns, and on top of that trading rooks! Without the rook trade it would have been a lot of work for Carlsen to prove his advantage, but the way the game went it was a very easy win for the Norwegian who didn't forgive Kramnik's mistakes.
GM Daniel King provides video analysis of Carlsen vs Krmanik
Some strange decisions by Kramnik allowed Carlsen to take the full point.
The spectators have a strong set of commentators, including Svidler and Grischuk!
The commentary room was completely full during the entire round.
The Trompowsky is especially suited for faster time controls as you don‘t have to memorise endless lines of theory, and you push your opponent out of their comfort zone after your second move.
Trompowsky Powerbook 2025 is based on 53,000 computer games from the engine room of playchess.com as well as 49,000 games from Mega and correspondence chess.
Trompowsky Powerbase 2025 is a database and contains a total of 8727 games from Mega 2025 and the Correspondence Database 2024, of which 316 are annotated.
2025 European Championship with a German double victory and analyses by Bluebaum, Svane, Rodshtein, Yuffa, Navara and many more. Opening videos by Engel, King and Marin. Training sections “The Fortress”, “The Trap” and “Fundamental Endgame Knowledge" etc.
2nd Move Anti-Sicilian Powerbase 2025 is a database and contains a total of 12090 games from Mega 2025 or the Correspondence Database 2024, of which 874 are annotated.
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