EU Individual Championships: Jan Werle wins

by ChessBase
9/19/2008 – The European Championship in Liverpool, England, with 141 players and a prize fund of 30,000 pounds, was won by the young Dutch grandmaster Jan Werle, half a point ahead of a trio consisting of Czech GM Viktor Laznicka and the top Brits Michael Adams and Nigel Short (who lost one game by ringtone). The reporting on the tournament site was exceptional. Big pictorial wrapup.

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The European Union Open Championships took place from September 9th to 18th September 2008 in Liverpool, England. The prize fund was 30,000 pounds (38,000 Euros or US $53,000) with a £6,000 first prize. The venue was the World Museum Liverpool, which has extensive collections covering archaeology, ethnology and the natural and physical sciences.


Main Entrance to the venue – the Liverpool World Museum on a sunny Thursday


The Museum "bughouse" was a favourite attraction for spectators and players


The playing hall, all ready for the final round to begin at noon


Top seed Michael Adams plays 1...e5 against Emanuel Berg


A peace accord is signed between the two after just 13 moves


Another favourite son, Nigel Short, who suffered a nasty ringtone loss in round two,
does full battle against Lithuanian GM Sarunas Sulskis, whom Nigel demolished in 23 moves. Take a look:

Short,N (2655) - Sulskis,S (2562) [C78]
4th ch-EU Liverpool ENG (10), 18.09.2008
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 b5 6.Bb3 Bc5 7.a4 Rb8 8.c3 d6 9.d4 Bb6 10.Na3 0-0 11.axb5 axb5 12.Nxb5 Bg4 13.Bc2 Bxf3 14.gxf3 Nh5 15.f4 Qh4

16.Qf3 exd4 17.e5 dxc3 18.bxc3 Bc5 19.Nxc7 Rbc8 20.Na6 Ba7 21.Bf5 Ne7 22.Bxc8 Nxc8 23.Nb4 1-0.


Latvian GM Daniel Fridman, who lives in Germany, came equal 5-15th with 7.0/10 points


The youth: David Howell, 17, the youngest UK grandmaster (right), against GM Erwin L'Ami, 23, of Holland. The fighting draw took 55 moves and left both players with 7.0/10 in 5-15th place.


Two other young talents: GM Jan Werle, 24, from Holland, rated 2591 and GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, 18, from France, rated 2681. The game was drawn in 17 moves, Jan Werle won the tournament alone with 8.0/10 points.


The winner: GM Jan Werle of The Netherlands

Final standings (top – total 141 players)

# Player Nat. Ti.
Rtng.
Pts
Opp.
TB
1 Werle, Jan NED GM
2591
8
2474
61
2 Laznicka, Viktor CZE GM
2601
2489
64
3 Adams, Michael ENG GM
2735
2538
63
4 Short, Nigel D ENG GM
2655
2457
59½
5 David, Alberto LUX GM
2568
7
2524
63½
6 L'ami, Erwin NED GM
2610
7
2479
63
7 Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime FRA GM
2681
7
2498
62½
8 Fridman, Daniel GER GM
2637
7
2481
62
9 Berg, Emanuel SWE GM
2592
7
2511
60½
10 Bacrot, Etienne FRA GM
2691
7
2495
59½
11 Howell, David W L ENG GM
2561
7
2442
59½
12 Tiviakov, Sergei NED GM
2645
7
2482
59
13 Luther, Thomas GER GM
2570
7
2436
57
14 Smeets, Jan NED GM
2593
7
2463
57
15 Beliavsky, Alexander G SLO GM
2606
7
2435
56
16 Abergel, Thal FRA IM
2499
2510
64
17 Meier, Georg GER GM
2556
2524
63½
18 Miezis, Normunds LAT GM
2540
2502
61½
19 D`Costa, Lorin A R ENG FM
2414
2436
60½
20 Sulskis, Sarunas LTU GM
2562
2444
59
21 Hillarp Persson, Tiger SWE GM
2526
2386
56
22 Carlsson, Pontus SWE GM
2514
2341
54
23 Conquest, Stuart C ENG GM
2536
6
2481
62
24 Edouard, Romain FRA IM
2508
6
2457
60½
25 Arakhamia-Grant, Ketevan SCO IM
2448
6
2490
60
26 Spoelman, Wouter NED IM
2448
6
2452
60
27 Shaw, John SCO GM
2469
6
2440
59½
28 Wells, Peter K ENG GM
2526
6
2447
59½
29 Jones, Gawain C B ENG GM
2549
6
2456
58½
30 Hebden, Mark L ENG GM
2520
6
2413
58
31 Dembo, Yelena GRE IM
2431
6
2398
57
32 Godena, Michele ITA GM
2519
6
2459
57
33 Haslinger, Stewart G ENG GM
2511
6
2421
56
34 Mcnab, Colin A SCO GM
2450
6
2419
56
35 Dgebuadze, Alexandre BEL GM
2562
6
2397
55½
36 Baramidze, David GER GM
2593
6
2358
55
37 Priborsky, Jan CZE  
2344
6
2384
55
38 Gordon, Stephen J ENG IM
2508
6
2379
54½
39 Pileckis, Emilis LTU  
2443
6
2390
54
40 Arkell, Keith C ENG GM
2506
6
2418
52½
41 Rausis, Igor CZE GM
2486
6
2420
52½
42 Houska, Jovanka ENG IM
2405
6
2298
52
43 Kotronias, Vasilios GRE GM
2574
6
2409
50
44 Williams, Simon K ENG GM
2496
6
2481
45½
45 Andersson, Ulf SWE GM
2562
6
2417
44½


A famous veteran: Ulf Andersson, who finished with 6.0/10 on place 45


Stuart Conquest, England, vs Thomas Luther, Germany. Luther won in 41 moves and finished at 7.0/10 in place 13. The German GM has a Thalidomide handicap, but plays a mean game of blitz. If you understand German you should check out the Fritz Trainer DVDs he has produced, together with WGM Eva Moser in the German Shop, e.g. on the Grunfeld, Philidor, Aljechin, and other general opening DVDs.


IM Evi Moser scored 5.5/10 and finished in 60th place


IM Jovanka Houska finished with 6.0/10 on place 42


WFM Alexandra ("Angelic Allie") Wilson scored 50% and finished in place 80

All of the above pictures are from the official site, which has done excellent work to present the tournament visually (and with daily reports). The pictures are mostly captioned, a rare but vitally important aspect of chess reporting. Publishing pictures of dozens of players without any indication of who they are is very close to useless. Take a look at how the organisers in Liverpool presented portraits of all the participants. Every picture has the title, name and rating. The round pictures are also well captioned and of exceptionally good quality. Finally a great deal of effort was put into the daily reports, which you can find here.

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