12/10/2021 – A few days ago the FIDE announced that the World Rapid and Blitz Championships due to Corona restrictions could not take place in Nur Sultan, Kazakhstan, as was originally planned. Now FIDE announced that they found a new venue: the World Rapid and Blitz Championships will take place in Warsaw on the planned dates (December 25 - December 31, 2021). | Photo: Qbolewicz

12/10/2021 – Magnus Carlsen picked up a fourth win at the World Championship match in Dubai to secure overall victory with three games to spare. Playing black, the world champion saw Ian Nepomniachtchi all but self-destructing for a third time in the match. This was Carlsen’s fourth consecutive defence of the title after becoming world champion in 2013. | Replay all the games with computer analysis. Full report to follow shortly | Photo: Niki Riga

12/10/2021 – The rook moves to the square f2. Most people knew that yesterday, which is wonderful! As always, the detailed solution is in the video, and there are many details to consider. We are briefly confused ourselves during the analysis. Today we have to solve a problem, starring Magnus Carlsen!

12/10/2021 – The new ChessBase Magazine Extra #204 offers two opening videos on Scandinavian and Catalan as well as a total of 26 games with detailed commentary, including analyses by Anish Giri, Romain Edouard and Michal Krasenkow. Peter Heine Nielsen, Magnus Carlsen's second, contributes "The brilliancy". And of course it's about am extraordinary game by the World Champion. In the final of the Meltwater Tour 2021 Carlsen outplayed Jan-Krzysztof Duda after a novelty ("At first it looks close to insanity.") in only 18 moves. Take a look!

12/10/2021 – After nine rounds three players shared first place with 7.0/9 each at the El Llobregat Open in Barcelona: Nodirbek Abdusattorov (Uzbekistan), Murali Khartikeyan (India), and Pere Garriga Cazorla, the best player from the host country. Abdusattorov then won the playoff and the tournament, Khartikeyan finished second. | Photos: Patricia Claros

12/10/2021 – The field of participants of the Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2022 is complete. Anish Giri (7th on the world ranking) and Jorden van Foreest, winner of the Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2021, will represent The Netherlands in the Tata Steel Masters. Both grandmaster groups consist of a mix of well-established players and promising young players. The 84th edition of the Tata Steel Chess Tournament will take place in Wijk aan Zee from 14 – 30 January 2022. | Photo: Jorden van Foreest (winner) and Anish Giri playing the tie-break during the Tata Steel Chess Tournament 2021 | Photo: Tata Steel Tournament

12/9/2021 – This week, well-known Dutch trainer Robert Ris looks at an entertaining attacking game in the King's Indian. Enjoy! | "Fast and Furious" is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a Premium account here.

12/9/2021 – The adventures we have had with Fritz! A unique experience was a match our program played in the Gulf state of Bahrain, back in 2002. The eight-game struggle ended in a hard-fought 4-4 draw. In a large pictorial article Frederic Friedel describes the intense battle against the reigning World Champion Vladimir Kramnik, and the three weeks spent by the ChessBase/Fritz team in a luxury hotel in Bahrain.

12/9/2021 – In today's episode, Svitlana wants to give some hope to all the Nepo fans out there. The Canadian WIM shows us some beautiful games of former World Chess Champions, who managed remarkable comebacks in World Championship matches. We are talking about players like Wilhelm Steinitz, Alexander Alekhine, and Bobby Fischer. All three of them were trailing in World Championship matches and all three of them could turn the tables around. Nepo, it ain't over, until it's over.

12/9/2021 – Winning a brilliancy is a delight! Fritz 18 shows you how to do it - with the "Evolving Genius" function. The program gives subtle hints, you find ways to play fantastic games. The renowned author and coach IM Robert Ris has tried it and played a spectacular, fast and furious game which he shows in a video. But Fritz 18 helps everyone to play brilliant games. And you can share these brilliancies and take part in our Fritz 18 lottery and win great prizes!. A lot of readers have already sent in brilliancies, we show the most beautiful victories in loose order! So, join the action and send your brilliancy to brilliancy@chessbase.com"!

12/9/2021 – The "body-check" is the right solution from yesterday, instead of an immediate "opposition". If the king goes to d4, the game can be won. The good news is, almost everyone knew that too. In door number 9 we again have only four pieces on the board, and again it is a really instructive endgame prime example.

12/9/2021 – During the World Championship match between Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi a number of other tournaments are played in Dubai. One of them is the Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid Rapid and Blitz Cup, in which 24 players from 22 countries took part. The winner of the Rapid Cup, a nine round Swiss, was Russian Grandmaster Vladimir Fedoseev. | Photos: Tournament Page