Aeroflot Open to kick off with Wei Yi as favourite

by Antonio Pereira
2/16/2019 – The Cosmos Hotel, located in north-central Moscow, will host the 17th edition of the Aeroflot Open. Group A currently counts 39 registered players rated 2600 or above, with 19-year-old Wei Yi as the top seed. The event is a great chance for players that are vying to get a place in the elite to prove themselves against formidable opposition. Nine rounds will be played starting Monday, with no rest days in between. | Photo: Amruta Mokal (archive)
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A ticket to the top

Besides the prize fund of 140,000 Euros, the Aeroflot Open provides a ticket to the Dortmund supertournament later this year. The 2018 edition saw Vladislav Kovalev comfortably taking clear first place, which was followed by shared second place in Dortmund. These remarkable performances got him an invitation to this year’s Tata Steel “B group”, which he won convincingly, getting an invitation to the 2020 Tata Steel Masters. The Byelorussian patiently climbed the ladder from Aeroflot to Wijk aan Zee’s main event.

The Open is tough, however, and it would be rather surprising to see Kovalev repeat last year’s feat. After all, he will arrive in Moscow as the fourth seed — curiously, two other participants share his 2703 rating.

Kovalev next to Korobov during last year's edition | Photo: Niklesh Jain 

The favourite rating-wise is 19-year-old Wei Yi. The youngster won the Chinese Championship three years in a row, between 2015 and 2017, and has already faced world-class opposition in tournaments like the Bilbao Masters and the Tata Steel Masters. Before Ding Liren’s rise in the world ranking, Wei Yi was considered the biggest hope for Chinese chess to get a World Championship contender. Of late, he has not participated as frequently in top events —nonetheless, he got first place in his last classical tournament, the Asian Continental Championship.

Second seed is Vladimir Fedoseev, who won the 2017 edition, when he was ‘barely’ the 18th seed. The Russian’s last tournament was the Tata Steel Masters, where he finished on a disappointing 5/13 — he defeated Shankland and Radjabov, and missed a big chance to take down world champion Magnus Carlsen. Back in 2017, he got a fine win over Maxim Matlakov, a game that was analysed by Alex Yermolinsky for Chessbase:

 
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This battle between two of the best young Russian players had a big impact on the standings. 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 d5 3.c4 e6 4.Nc3 Bb4 5.Qb3 A bit of an offside line. c5 6.dxc5 Na6 More popular is 6...Nc6 7.Bg5 dxc4 8.Qxc4 Qa5 9.Bxf6 The endgame offers nothing to White: 9.Rc1 Qxc5 10.Qxc5 Bxc5 11.e3 Bb4 12.a3 Bxc3+ 13.Rxc3 Ne4 Nakamura-Aronian, LOndon Classic, 2016. 9...gxf6 10.Rc1 Qxc5 11.Qh4 Ke7 The black king is relatively safe here. 12.g3 Bxc3+ 13.bxc3 13.Rxc3 Qb4 13...b6 14.Bg2 Bb7 15.0-0 Matlakov himself had a crack at this posiiton with White against Alexandrov in 2010, and failed to make the most of it after Rad8 16.Nd4 h5 17.Rcd1 Rd6 18.Rd3 Ba6 19.Rf3 Rh6 Once White is forced to trade his strong Nd4 there isn't a whole lot he can do. 7.a3 Bxc3+ 8.Qxc3 Nxc5 9.cxd5 Qxd5 10.Be3 At least here White can boast about his bishop pair. Nce4 11.Qe5 Qxe5 12.Nxe5 Nd5 13.Bc1! Vladimir Fedoseev is 21 years old, but he handles this game like a seasoned pro. White needs to preserve his DSB at any cost.. Nc5 13...f6 14.Nd3 Kf7 15.f3 Nd6 16.e4 Ne7 17.Be3 14.Rb1 f6 14...Nb3?! would be consistent, but the whole operation costs Black too much time, which is telling after 15.e4 Nf6 16.f3 Nxc1 17.Rxc1± What to do here? Ke7 is no good: 18.Rc7+ Kd6 19.Nxf7+ Kxc7 20.Nxh8 Bd7 21.Nf7 and having snatched an important pawn the knight escapes unscathed. 15.Nc4 e5 16.f3! The key to White's success in such positions is the proper pawn placement. Ke7 17.e4 Nf4 18.Be3 Ncd3+ Perhaps, a small structural damage had to be conceded in order to facilitate Black's development. 18...b6!? 19.Bxd3 Nxd3+ 20.Ke2 Nf4+ 21.Bxf4 exf4 22.Na5! Vladimir Kramnik has used this knight placement to gtreat success in similar positions. b6 It's all about the c6-square, and now the knight gets there. It was high time to look for counterplay: 22...Rd8 23.Rhc1 23.Rhd1 Rxd1 24.Rxd1 Bd7= 23...f5 24.Rc7+ Kf8 Now in case of 25.Rd1 Rxd1 26.Kxd1 fxe4 27.fxe4 b6 28.Nc6 Bg4+ 29.Kd2 Re8 30.Kd3 f3 Black seems to be getting somewhere. 23.Nc6+ Kd6? Practically speaking, a losing move. Only 23...Ke6 24.Rbc1 Bd7 would leave Black a chance to escape. 25.Nd4+ Ke7 26.Rc7 Kd6 27.Rhc1 Rac8 28.Nf5+ 28.Nb5+?? Bxb5+ well, check. 28...Bxf5 29.R1c6+ Ke5 is a fascinating position. White seems to be close, but he can't quite secure his advantage, neither in 30.Re7+ nor 30.exf5 Rxc7 31.Rxc7 a5 32.Rxg7 Rc8 33.Kd3 Rd8+ 34.Kc3 Rc8+ 35.Kb3 h6 30...Kd4 31.Rd6+ Kc4 32.exf5 Kb3 24.Rbc1 Ba6+ 25.Kf2 Rhc8 26.Rhd1+ Ke6 27.g3 fxg3+ 28.hxg3 g6 Maxim felt he had to get the f5-square under control. 28...Bb7 29.Nd4+ Kf7 30.Nf5! Rxc1 31.Rxc1 and there's no Rc8 on account of 29.f4 Bb7 He must have thought he was safe here. 29...h5 30.Ke3 Re8 31.f5+ gxf5 32.Nd4+ Kf7 33.Nxf5 and at least one of White's rooks gets to the 7th rank. 30.f5+! Suddenly Black is losing material. An excellent display of positional chess by Vladimir Kramnik. Sorry, I meant to say, Fedoseev. 1–0
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WhiteEloWBlackEloBResYearECOEventRnd
Fedoseev,V2658Matlakov,M27011–02017Aeroflot Open A 20178.1

Another Chinese star is placed third in the starting rank list — Harbin-born Wang Hao. The 29-year-old took a shot at elite chess roughly between 2010 and 2014, with his best performance achieved at the 2012 Biel Chess Festival, where he got clear first place ahead of Magnus Carlsen, Anish Giri and Hikaru Nakamura. He started well in the latest World Rapid Championship but could not keep up the pace and finished on 9½/15.

Tied with Kovalev and Rauf Mamedov with a 2703 rating is Daniil Dubov. The 22-year-old Russian recently got the biggest achievement of his career when he took clear first place at the aforementioned World Rapid Championship. During his great performance in Saint Petersburg, it was widely revealed — although some people already knew — that he had helped Magnus Carlsen during his preparation for last year’s London match against Fabiano Caruana.

The current rapid world champion, Daniil Dubov | Photo: Lennart Ootes

Besides the usual strong 2600-players — Inarkiev, Nabaty, Korobov, etc. — a group of future stars will be looking for their big break. Parham Maghsoodloo is the current world junior champion; Alexey Sarana already participated in a Russian Superfinal; Alireza Firouzja will try to continue his accelerated rise; and Andrey Esipenko will arrive in Moscow after a strong performance at the Tata Steel Challengers. And these are only a few…

In addition to the 9-round Swiss classical open, a blitz tournament will be organised on February 28th, with a prize fund of 20,000 Euros — the winner will take home 5,000 Euros. It will be a double nine-round Swiss event with a time control of 3 minutes for the whole game and 2-second increments from move one.

Esipenko finished shared second in Wijk aan Zee's "B group" — surely he wanted more | Photo: Alina l'Ami

Registered players (top 30)

No.   Name FideID FED Rtg
1 GM Wei Yi 8603405 CHN 2733
2 GM Fedoseev Vladimir 24130737 RUS 2715
3 GM Wang Hao 8602883 CHN 2714
4 GM Dubov Daniil 24126055 RUS 2703
5 GM Kovalev Vladislav 13504398 BLR 2703
6 GM Mamedov Rauf 13401653 AZE 2703
7 GM Inarkiev Ernesto 4162722 RUS 2692
8 GM Nabaty Tamir 2809052 ISR 2688
9 GM Korobov Anton 14105730 UKR 2687
10 GM Safarli Eltaj 13402129 AZE 2681
11 GM Sasikiran Krishnan 5004985 IND 2678
12 GM Maghsoodloo Parham 12539929 IRI 2666
13 GM Sjugirov Sanan 4189302 RUS 2663
14 GM Sethuraman S.P. 5021596 IND 2651
15 GM Anton Guijarro David 2285525 ESP 2642
16 GM Zvjaginsev Vadim 4113403 RUS 2642
17 GM Iturrizaga Bonelli Eduardo 3901211 VEN 2640
18 GM Ganguly Surya Shekhar 5002150 IND 2636
19 GM Alekseenko Kirill 4135539 RUS 2634
20 GM Indjic Aleksandar 911925 SRB 2630
21 GM Sarana Alexey 24133795 RUS 2630
22 GM Kobalia Mikhail 4119150 RUS 2627
23 GM Paravyan David 4194985 RUS 2627
24 GM Grachev Boris 4129199 RUS 2626
25 GM Khismatullin Denis 4142578 RUS 2621
26 GM Firouzja Alireza 12573981 IRI 2618
27 GM Van Foreest Jorden 1039784 NED 2618
28 GM Martirosyan Haik M. 13306553 ARM 2616
29 GM Zhou Jianchao 8603537 CHN 2615
30 GM Chigaev Maksim 4108116 RUS 2613

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Antonio is a freelance writer and a philologist. He is mainly interested in the links between chess and culture, primarily literature. In chess games, he skews towards endgames and positional play.

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