Corus 10: Topalov blunders, Lucky Loek holds

Corus Chess Tournament Wijk aan Zee 14 – 30 January 2005 Official web site – Live coverage – All ChessBase reports

Round ten

Adams vs Kramnik was the first game to end, after 90 minutes, almost immediately after the players got out of theory in the Petroff Defence. Adams was satisfied to hold on to his place in the tournament table; and Kramnik was fine with a black coloured draw against such a wily opponent.

Short vs Svidler was a positional Najdorf in which White was always slightly better. The two GMs are good friends, drawn to each other amongst other things by a common love for the game of cricket. But this was a real game in which either player would have gone for the other's throat had opportunity presented itself.

Short and Svidler. The two cricket friends analyse their game. Photo: Corus

Morozevich vs Leko was an Exchange Slav, using "strange moves" (like 7...Bd7) to try to get the superbly in-form Hungarian into murky waters. However Leko Leko replied with 8.Nge2?! and was well on the path to a clear advantage when he spurned 12...Qb6 and instead played 12...Nc4 , apparently overlooking the strength of the white knights jumping around in the position.

Morozevich,A (2741) - Leko,P (2749) [D10]
Corus A Wijk aan Zee NED (10), 26.01.2005
1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.cxd5 cxd5 5.Bf4 Nc6 6.e3 a6 7.Rc1 Bg4 8.f3 Bd7 9.Nge2 e6 10.Bg3 Rc8 11.Nf4 Na5 12.Be2.

12...Nc4 13.Bxc4 Rxc4 14.Nd3 Be7 15.Qb3 b5 16.0-0 0-0 17.Ne5 Rc8 18.Ne2 Qb6 19.Bh4 Qd6 20.Nf4 a5 21.Nfd3 and ½-½ in 64 moves.

Morozevich and Leko analysing after the game

Anand vs van Wely was one of those chess tragedies, where one side completely outplays the other and, for reasons beyond the human ken is unable to convert the position into victory. Anand was three (drei, trois, tri, munru) pawns up at move 22, and stayed in that blissful situation for ten moves – without being able to convert this advantage into a full point. In the end he was on the verge of concluding that chess must be a flawed game, especially since running through the moves with Fritz was slow to reveal any decisive alternatives. In the end he came up with the following:

Here Anand overruled his instincts to play the simple and straightforward 28...Re8+, which he came up with about ten milliseconds into his ponder, and instead went for the more sophisticated 28.Be8, which allowed Black to escape. "It is ironic," said Anand ruefully at breakfast this morning, "that if I had played Re8+ and not won the game people would have all said that I was not working hard enough at the board, just going for simple solutions. Now they will be saying I had overworked the position, looking for a convoluted solutions where there is a simple, elegant win available." The game continued: 28...Ra7 29.Nb6 Rf5 30.Qg4? (30.Nd7 with the idea Qg4 looks more promising) 30...Rf8 31.Rf1 Be5 32.Bd7 Nxd5 33.Rxe5 dxe5 34.Nxd5 Qd6 35.Be6 Re8 36.Rc1 Qxe6 37.Qxe6 Rxe6 38.b3 Rf7 39.Kg2 Rg6+ 40.Kf1 Rh6 41.Kg2 Rg6+ 42.Kf1 Rh6 ½-½.

Topalov-Polgar was a tragedy of a different kind. The Bulgarian GM, who has been leading in this tournament for a while, was doing fine in a strategic Queen's Indian

Topalov,V (2757) - Polgar,Ju (2728) [E15]
Corus A Wijk aan Zee NED (10), 26.01.2005
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.g3 Ba6 5.b3 Bb4+ 6.Bd2 Be7 7.Nc3 0-0 8.Rc1 d5 9.cxd5 Nxd5 10.Nxd5 exd5 11.Bg2 Re8 12.Rc2 Bd6 13.Bg5 Bb4+ 14.Kf1 f6 15.Bf4 Nd7 16.Ne1 c6 17.Nd3 Bxd3 18.Qxd3 Rc8 19.Bh3 g6 20.a3 Bf8 21.e3 Qe7

Here Toplaov played 22.Bg4 and overlooked the simple 22...g5, which traps the white bishop on f4. Well, it is not as simple as that. White did not overlook the move, he was expecting to be able to play 23.Qf5 Red8 24.Rxc6!, but the refutation that came from Judit Polgar was of course 23...gxf4 24.gxf4 Kh8, and with a piece down Topalov didn't have a chance against the world's strongest female player. Mind you he could have still tried 24.Qxd7 (instead of 24.gxf4) when 24...Qe4 skewers both the white rooks, but after 25.Rg1 Qxc2 26.Bf5 Qd1+ 27.Kg2 Qh5 (to stop the mate on h7) 28.Be6+ Kh8 29.Bf7 White has successfully executed a conuter-skewer.

The game continued 25.Rg1 Rc7 26.Bf3 Nb8 27.Rg3 Qd6 28.b4 b5 29.Rc1 a5 30.bxa5 Qxa3 31.Rc5 Rg7 32.Bh5 Rd8 33.Qxf6 Qxa5 34.Rc2 b4 35.Ra2 Qc7 36.Be2 Qe7 37.Qf5 Qe4 38.Qxe4 dxe4 39.Ra8 b3 40.Bc4 b2 41.Ba2 c5 42.dxc5 b1Q+ 43.Bxb1 Rd1+ 44.Kg2 Rxb1 45.Ra4 Re7 46.Rg5 Nc6 47.Ra6 Re6 48.h4 Be7 49.f5 Rf6 50.Rg4 Rb4 51.Ra8+ Rf8 52.Rxf8+ Bxf8 53.f6 Ne5 0-1. Judit Polgar got the public prize for this effort, but when we congratulated her on the "gift" she had received from Topalov she replied wryly "Yes, but maybe I deserved it after all the gifts I have given away myself in this tournament!"

Grischuk vs Ponomariov was a one-sided affair, with the young Russian Grischuk in no mood to trifle after his disappointing loss to Peter Svidler in the previous round. The victim of his wrath was the always cheerful Ruslan Ponomariov, who by his own admission misplayed the opening. Grischuk put it a bit more harshly in the press conference: "Pono simply does not understand such positions." Play through this game for a lesson in how someone who understands this particular variation of the Najdorf correctly will handle it.

Grischuk,A (2710) - Ponomariov,R (2700) [B90]
Corus A Wijk aan Zee NED (10), 26.01.2005
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be3 Ng4 7.Bc1 Nf6 8.f3 Qb6 9.g4 Nc6 10.Nb3 e6 11.Qe2 Qc7 12.Be3 b5 13.0-0-0 Nd7 14.Qf2 Be7 15.g5 Nce5 16.a3 Rb8 17.Rg1 Nb6 18.f4 Nec4 19.Bxc4 Nxc4 20.Bd4 0-0 21.Bf6 Bb7 22.Rd3 Rfc8 23.Rh3 Kf8 24.Rxh7 Ke8 25.Bxg7 Kd7 26.g6 a5 27.gxf7 Bf8 28.Bxf8 Rxf8 29.Rd1 Bc8 30.f5 e5 31.Nd5 1-0.

Bruzon-Sokolov was another very satisfactory encounter for the young Cuban, who qualified from last year's B Group and for one brief round even led in this tournament. In a Closed Ruy Lopze he "skalped" (as the official bulletin puts it) the disastrously out-of-form Ivan Sokolov. Bruzon is playing more than 100 points above his nominal 2652 rating. He is also a very nice fellow, so we should be seeing a lot more of him in the future.

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Meet Natalie Sukova

Ukrainian WGM Natalia Zhukova (Elo 2465), who is doing well in the C Group, has won numerous international events, most noticeably the super-strong first European Women championship in 2000. She is the top woman player in her country, and leads its national Olympic team.

And posing for the Corus web site, where there are a lot of additional pictures

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