The World Cadets & Youth Rapid Championships were held online this year, and the organization was up to the challenge. Earlier this month, the continental preliminaries took place, while the final knockout stage was played on December 19-22.
Personally, I was involved coaching the Dutch kids, and three Dutch girls made it to the KO stage. Eline Roebers and Machteld van Foreest both played in the Girls U14 and faced each other in the quarterfinals. After a tough fight, Eline won and in fact went on to become World Champion! We will study a tense game Eline won in the final.
Eline has been a long-time student of Robert Ris, also a ChessBase columnist and author.
Additional note: Don’t be misled by the ratings of the players. White has been over 2200 in the past (youth ratings jump up and down a lot these days because of the new 40 K-factor), and generally ratings of young players were frozen because of corona. I would currently estimate both players at 2200/2300 level.
And if you speak Dutch, check out this article in a major Dutch newspaper, featuring both Eline and Machteld!
Warm-up question: What would you play here with Black?
Many more Game of the Week shows are available in ChessBase Videos
