8/29/2022 – Arjun Erigaisi won his final-round game against David Anton to clinch first place at the 28th Abu Dhabi Masters. He played with the sole purpose of winning the game, as he kept manoeuvring until his opponent broke and made a mistake. Javokhir Sindarov and Jorden van Foreest claimed second and third place, scoring 7/9 and 6½/9 points, respectively. Six out out of top ten places were claimed by Indians. | Photo: Rupali Mullick
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Indian players had outstanding performances in the Abu Dhabi Masters as they claimed six out of the top ten places. A total of five Indians obtained norms. Apart from Aditya Samant, IM P Shyam Nikhil is the only other IM to finish in the top 25. Shyam scored 6/9 to finish in 21st place. He is one GM norm away from becoming India’s next Grandmaster.
Arjun Erigaisi won his final-round game against David Anton to clinch first place. He played with the sole purpose of winning the game, as he kept manoeuvring until his opponent broke and made a mistake. Javokhir Sindarov and Jorden van Foreest claimed second and third place, scoring 7/9 and 6½/9 points, respectively.
The eventual champion, 18-year-old Arjun, opted for the Exchange Variation when he faced Anton’s Caro-Kann Defence.
Arjun’s knights are stronger than Black’s bishop pair, due to the almost grid-locked pawn structure. White slowly manoeuvred his king to a3 and then started rearranging his pieces to find the best squares and the best plan.
Black decided to give up the f5-pawn as it did not make a big difference. It was more important to control the h-file, thus 43...Qh8 preventing an immediate Rh1. The game continued 44.Nxf5+ Bxf5 45.Qxf5 Qh3 46.Qd3 Qg2 47.Re1 Qf2 48.Re3 Qg1 49.Ne1 preventing all possibilities of a queen invasion on the queenside.
Eventually Black crumbled: 63...Kf8 64.c6+- Rc4 65.Qb2 Rxa4+?? 66.Rxa4 Qxa4+ 67.Qa3+. Black resigned as the resultant pawn ending is completely winning for White. Thus, Arjun Erigaisi won the game and became the champion of 28th Abu Dhabi Masters.
The final moments of the deciding game
Arjun Erigaisi is currently the second-highest rated Indian player in the world. At 18, he has climbed to the world top 25 in the live ratings list!
This DVD allows you to learn from the example of one of the best players in the history of chess and from the explanations of the authors how to successfully organise your games strategically, and how to keep your opponent permanently under pressure.
The one who inspired the nation and beyond, Vishy Anand, congratulated Arjun.
In third place - GM Jorden van Foreest (Netherlands) scored 6½/9 points | Photo: Rupali Mullick
Interview with Arjun Erigaisi
Final standings
A total of 148 players from 31 countries, including 43 GMs, 35 IMs, 7 WGMs and 3 WIMs, took part. The tournament was organized by the Abu Dhabi Chess Club & Mind Games from on August 17-25. The 9-round Swiss tournament had a time control of 90 minutes plus 30- second increments from move one.
In this video series, it's all about understanding middlegame strategies better. Pawn structures, manoeuvres and concepts are being shown through model games. New: now also available as stream!
Shahid AhmedShahid Ahmed is the senior coordinator and editor of ChessBase India. He enjoys covering chess tournaments and also likes to play in chess events from time to time.
You will learn how Black's dynamic piece activity and structural counterplay more than compensate for White's extra tempo in the colour-reversed setups.
In this course, you’ll learn how to take the initiative against the London and prevent White from comfortably playing their usual system by playing 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bf4 Nh5.
London System Powerbase 2026 is a database and contains in all 11 285 games from Mega 2026 and the Correspondence Database 2026, of which 282 are annotated.
The London System Powerbook 2026 is based on more than 410 000 games or game fragments from different opening moves and ECO codes; what they all have in common is that White plays d4 and Bf4 but does not play c4.
In this course, Grandmaster Elisabeth Pähtz presents the London System, a structured and ambitious approach based on the immediate Bf4, leading to rich and dynamic positions.
Opening videos: Open Spanish (Sipke Ernst) and Classical Sicilian (Nico Zwirs). Endgame Special by Igor Stohl: ‘Short or long side’ – where should the defending king be placed in rook endgames? ‘Lucky bag’ with 35 master analyses.
YOUR EASY ACCESS TO OPENING THEORY: Whether you want to build up a reliable and powerful opening repertoire or find new opening ideas for your existing repertoire, the Opening Encyclopaedia covers the entire opening theory on one product.
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