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16th Dubai Open Chess ChampionshipIt is the strongest Open tournament in the Middle East and one of the most popular chess events on the world calendar. The tournament is in its 16th year and has a special place in chess history. Magnus Carlsen, the current World Champion and highest rated player in the world, played in the Dubai Open in 2004. Carlsen was already rated 2552 but had only two GM norms. He scored his final norm in this tournament, thus becoming a GM at the age of 13 years and five months. There are many strong players playing in this tournament this year – no one above 2700, but even the tenth seed has a healthy rating of 2635. |
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The 16th Dubai Open 2014 (7th-17th April) like every year is held in the Dubai Chess and Culture Centre, which is the biggest than most modern dedicated chess club in the world. The building is quite exquisite and is built in the shape of a chess rook. Here are some panorama pictures:
Click on the images and hold the right button down to scroll left or right
This year the main tournament has attracted 148 players from 39 countries, including 79 titled players. There are 38 GMs in the field and the average rating of the tournament is 2214. The time control is one hour 30 mins + 30 seconds increment per move. As there is only a single time control, you can see a lot of mistakes being made even by the best players. The schedule of the tournament is quite puzzling. While there is a rest day, immediately after it they have two games in one day! Many strong players are deterred from taking part in the tournament for this reason, I guess, but on the other hand the prize money is a strong incentive. The first prize for the event is US $10,000, with the total prize fund of $50,000. That’s a quite a lot of money!
The tournament has nine rounds with a rest day after four rounds. On the rest day there is a very nice tradition of holding a blitz tournament. This year it was won by GM Eduardo Itturizaga Bonelli (above) from Venezuela.
Video of the Dubai Open International Blitz by Vijay Kumar (see below)
Anton Korobov (2698) from Ukraine is the top seed for the event
Second seed Armenian GM Vladimir Akopian, rated 2674
Third seed, the very talented French GM Romain Edouard,
rated 2670, who was born in the same year as Magnus (1990).
Fourth seed: French GM Andrei Istratescu (2667), who crossed
swords with the world’s elite in London Chess Classic 2013
Fifth seed: top Romanian GM Constantin Lupulescu (2660)
Sixth seed: Hungarian GM Csaba Balogh (2656)
Seventh seed: a theory expert and after Adams, McShane and Short,
the fourth highest rated player from England: GM Gawain Jones (2650)
One of Ukraine’s big talents: Yuri Kuzubov (2639)
The tournament witnessed a lot of upsets in the initial rounds but one player was able to emerge unscathed after four rounds.
GM Abhijeet Gupta from India made a scintillating start with 4.0/4. The talented Indian, who at one point in his career had an rating of 2667, witnessed a slump in form when he reached 2583 in July 2013. But since then he has been regaining the lost ground and is now on 2630. Abhijeet was in full flow, but he met his match in round five.
Round five: Abhijit Gupta vs Romain Edouard
The game was a Queen’s Gambit Accepted. Abhijeet played the opening wonderfully and sacrificed a pawn to get substantial compensation in the form of a weak black king. Edouard was completely on the back foot and at one point it seemed the game was already over in White’s favour. But Abhijeet kept missing his chances and in the end he needed to make a draw by finding only moves. With the roles reversed Abhijeet was not able to to this new situation, blundered and promptly resigned.
It was now Romain’s turn to be the sole leader of the tournament after five rounds, with 4.5/5. However he had very strong opposition in the form of GM Vladimir Akopian in round six.
Round six: Romain Edouard vs Vladimir Akopian
This one was a colossal fight. Edouard opened the game with his king pawn and Akopian replied with the Paulsen. A Maroczy Bind was set up by White and as is usual in such structures quite some manoeuvring went on. However, suddenly the position became very tense and sharp after Black’s move 24…f5. Akopian had set a devilish trap, into which Romain fell. At this point Black held the advantage. But, over the board it was extremely difficult to find the best moves. Add to that time pressure and a lot of errors were made by Akopian. When the tide was turning, the young Frenchmen had a chance to either force a draw or to continue to playing. He chose the latter and was rewarded with the full point.
After six rounds the tournament is being solely lead by GM Romain Edouard from France with a rating performance of 2919. His play can be described as being very tenacious. His never-say-die attitude has given him two wins from bad positions against extremely strong players. While against Akopian he fought back from a slightly inferior position, against Gupta he was completely lost. Usually when players survive such scares they go on to win the tournament. Romain has been holding his nerves marvellously. Only three rounds remain. GM Bogner Sebastian and GM Abhijeet Gupta are right on his heels with 5/6.
| Rk. | Sd | Name | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB2 | TB3 | |
| 1 | 3 | GM | Edouard Romain | FRA | 2670 | 5.5 | 25.0 | 21.5 |
| 2 | 12 | GM | Gupta Abhijeet | IND | 2630 | 5.0 | 22.5 | 20.5 |
| 3 | 22 | GM | Bogner Sebastian | SUI | 2587 | 5.0 | 19.0 | 17.0 |
| 4 | 20 | GM | Bachmann Axel | PAR | 2598 | 4.5 | 23.5 | 21.0 |
| 5 | 10 | GM | Iturrizaga Eduardo | VEN | 2635 | 4.5 | 23.0 | 20.5 |
| 6 | 16 | GM | Stevic Hrvoje | CRO | 2607 | 4.5 | 23.0 | 20.0 |
| 7 | 17 | GM | Andriasian Zaven | ARM | 2603 | 4.5 | 23.0 | 20.0 |
| 8 | 35 | GM | Ismagambetov Anuar | KAZ | 2493 | 4.5 | 22.5 | 19.5 |
| 9 | 1 | GM | Korobov Anton | UKR | 2698 | 4.5 | 22.5 | 19.5 |
| 10 | 24 | GM | Brkic Ante | CRO | 2568 | 4.5 | 21.5 | 19.0 |
| 11 | 27 | GM | Ghaem Maghami Ehsan | IRI | 2556 | 4.5 | 21.5 | 19.0 |
| 12 | 15 | GM | Rakhmanov Aleksandr | RUS | 2610 | 4.5 | 21.5 | 18.5 |
| 13 | 8 | GM | Kuzubov Yuriy | UKR | 2639 | 4.5 | 20.5 | 18.5 |
| 14 | 18 | GM | Iordachescu Viorel | MDA | 2601 | 4.5 | 20.5 | 18.5 |
| 15 | 14 | GM | Petrosian Tigran L. | ARM | 2627 | 4.5 | 20.5 | 17.5 |
| 16 | 31 | GM | Rahman Ziaur | BAN | 2513 | 4.5 | 18.5 | 16.5 |
The author of these lines, Sagar Shah with the winner of 2013
Dubai Open Alexander Rakhmanov, who is currently on 4.5/6.
Indian TV journalist Vijay Kumar's reports can be seen by litereally hundreds of millions of viewers.
16th Dubai Open Chess Championship 2014 round one
16th Dubai Open Chess Championship 2014 round two
16th Dubai Open Chess Championship 2014 round three
16th Dubai Open Chess Championship 2014 round four
16th Dubai Open Chess Championship 2014 round five
16th Dubai Open Chess Championship 2014 round six
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