ETCC R08: Hungry Hungarians!

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ETCC R08: Hungry Hungarians!

We are nearing the end of the European Team Championships 2015, and after the penultimate round Russia continued their two point lead over the field in both the sections. In the open section Russia was held to a draw by Armenia, and now has 14.0/16 match points. They are followed by Hungary on twelve points, the only team that has the theoretical chance of winning gold. Russia faces Hungary in the final round, which makes it a very interesting finale. The Russian women team is leading with 15.0/16 match points. The only teams that can catch them, if they lose, are Ukraine and Georgia who have 13.0/16 points. Ukraine has an excellent tiebreak, because of the huge margins by which they have won their matches. However it seems unlikely that Russia would lose to the German team in the last round. Let’s first turn our attention to the highly interesting board one clash of the eighth round in the open section between Russia and Armenia.

Svidler and Aronian played out a tame draw on board one

The best game of the day award should really go to Gabriel Sargissian for his superb positional victory over Alexander Grischuk. Sargissian stayed true to his tag of a fantastic team tournament player, and simply outplayed his Russian opponent without giving him a single chance. This game is a must-watch for all the players who would like to learn the art of converting small advantages.

Sargissian and Aronian might have different perceptions towards how they assess a game of chess,
but both of them would agree that the former played a masterpiece today!

Ian Nepomniachtchi turned out to be the saviour for the Russian team,
as he downed Sergei Movsesian from the white side of a Sicilian Taimanov

The last board game between Jakovenko and Melkumyan ended in a draw and the match was tied at 2:2. Quite a good result for the Armenian team, who are in fourth position after eight rounds.

Maxime Vachier Lagrave didn’t seem too confident and forced a quick draw against Baadur Jobava’s Caro Kann. Mikheil Mchedlishvili had a definite edge against Laurent Fressinet, but was unable to convert it.

Levan Pantsulaia has been firing at will for the Georgian team. He scored yet another crucial victory when his opponent Edouard Romain overstretched in a position where he had to take the draw by perpetual check.

Pantsulaia is surely playing the tournament of his life. He has a score of 6.5/8 against an average opposition of 2617! This comes to a mammoth rating performance of 2868, and he is gaining 30 Elo points from the event. He has been given rest for the last round which confirms his gold medal on board three.

Merab Gagunashvili was unable to hold his position against Etienne Bacrot
on the fourth board, which resulted in the match being tied at 2:2

The match of the day was surely the one between Azerbaijan and Hungary. Both the teams were quite evenly matched, but Judit’s boys went on a rampage, giving a thorough drubbing to their opponents, beating them with a hefty margin of 3.5:0.5.

The top board clash between Mamedyarov and Leko ended in a draw. Richard Rapport came out all guns blazing against Teimous Radjabov. After playing a high unusual opening, which on the other hand is quite usual for Richard, he gained a small edge. From move 25 until the end of the game (move 36) was just high quality chess from the 19-year-old Hungarian prodigy. A must-watch game:

The way he plays chess truly makes Richard Rapport a rock-star! [Picture by Amruta Mokal]

Zoltan Almasi had a wild and complicated game in the Nimzo Indian against Arkadij Naiditsch, which ended in favour of the Hungarian. On the last board Ferenc Berkes got just the kind of position he likes – a solid one with a slight edge. With his phenomenal technique he crushed the life out of Eltaj Safarli. The Hungarians now have a chance to finish the tournament on a high by beating the leaders Russia in the final round.

Anish Giri has not been in the news thanks to an extremely solid event, where he has made five draws (also three wins!). But in the eighth round he was able to set a very nasty trap against Alexei Shirov. The Latvian, who is famed for his tactical abilities, surprisingly, fell right into it.

Giri – Shirov, round eight

Giri attacked the black queen with Re3 and Shirov defended with ...Rd3. What was wrong with that?

Pavel Eljanov played a nice little combination against Grzegorz Gajewski,
to give Ukraine a 2.5:1.5 victory over Poland

Magnus Carlsen keeps shedding rating points. He drew his game against Nisipeanu and is now down to 2830
in the live ratings. In the last round he will face Poland’s Radoslaw Wojtaszek with the white pieces.

Nigel Short scored his first win of the tournament with a highly eventful game against Baris Esen. Have a look at this gem to see the unusual opening essayed by the Englishman, the highly dubious sacrifice by Baris, the harmonious mating attack by two rooks and two bishops, and Nigel’s attempt at another immortal king walk at the end of the game.

The two host teams faced off against each other, which ended in a 2.5:1.5 win for team Iceland. Margeir Petursson won his game, but his efforts were overshadowed by Hedinn Steingrimsson and Horjvar Steinn Gretarsson scoring full points.

Team pairings and results of round eight

Full pairings and board results

Rankings after round eight

Tie Break1: Matchpoints (2 for wins, 1 for draws, 0 for losses)
Tie Break2: Olympiad-Sonneborn-Berger-Tie-Break without lowest result (Khanty-Mansiysk)
Tie Break3: points (game-points)

Women's section

The Russian women’s team faced a small scare today after Valentina Gunina went down to Karina Szczepkowska-Horowska. But Alexandra Kosteniuk and Aleksandra Goryachkina steadied the ship with fine wins over Monika Socko and Joanna Majdan-Gajewska. Russia won the match 2.5:1.5

Alexandra Kosteniuk: the Russian colours are everywhere in Reykjavik!

Nana Dzagnidze was rested, hence Bela Khotenashvili (above) played on the top board for Georgia.
She scored a fine win over Szidonia Vajda that helped her team win the match 2.5:1.5

The Ukrainian women continued their no-nonsense approach by blanking the team from France 4:0. Mariya Muzychuk with her win over Marie Sebag now has 6.0/7, and has already gained 16 Elo points from the event. She now has a live rating of 2558. Anna Muzychuk scored a nice win over Almira Skripchenko in just 20 moves, but it was only after her opponent blundered pretty badly on her 15th turn.

Anna Muzychuk took full advantage of her opponent’s blunder and powered her team to a 4:0 victory

Romania lost their match against Italy, but Alina l’Ami (above) scored a fantastic win
over Olga Zimina. The final position of the game is aesthetically quite pleasing!

Team pairings and results of round eight

Full pairings and board results

Rankings after round eight

Note: The final round begins four hours before prior round timings, that is at 11 a.m. Reykjavik time.

Pictures by Hrafn Jökulsson on the official facebook page of ETCC 2015

Links Official tournament site Download all games in PGN: Open + Women The games are being broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download a free Playchess client there and get immediate access. You can also use ChessBase or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs.