58th Russian Championship Superfinal

The final stage of the Russian Championship is taking place from December 19-30, 2005, in Moscow, with rounds starting each day at 15:00h local time. It is a 12 player round robin, with time controls of 100/40, then 50/20, 10/rest, with a 30 seconds increment from move one. The total prize fund is US $130,000, with $40,000 going to the winner

Round seven report

GM Dmitry Jakovenko

Volkov vs Svidler saw two players not interested in a fight, and a game ending after twelve moves in a draw.

Khalifman vs Motylev began with twelve moves of Queen's Indian theory and ended, after considerable thought by both players, on move 19 in a draw.

Zvjaginsev-Dreev was a tough battle which ended on move 55, when White could not make a full point out of his extra pawn.

Kramnik-Rublevsky was interesting, but produced a novelty only at move 19, and a draw eight moves later.

Bareev-Morozevich was a highly volatile, as is usually the case when Alexander Morozevich is involved in a game. He was fighting for a place in the top group after losing a game by default (oversleeping) in round three. Today he was in a fighting move but got into big trouble against a player with ambitions of his own.

Bareev,E (2675) - Morozevich,A (2707) [E38]
ch-RUS Superfinal Moscow RUS (7), 26.12.2005
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Qc2 c5 5.dxc5 Qc7 6.Nf3 Bxc5 7.g3 a6 8.Bf4 d6 9.Bg2 h6 10.Rc1N [in Kazan 2005 Khalifman played 10.0-0 e5 11.Bd2 Be6 12.Rac1 and drew] 10...Nc6 11.0-0 e5 12.Nd5 Nxd5 13.cxd5 exf4 14.dxc6 fxg3 15.hxg3 Qxc6

Black has a pawn but a very depressed position, and White launches an attack: 16.b4 Bxb4? (a bishop retreat to b6 or a7 was required) 17.Qb2 Bc5 18.Ng5 Qd7 19.Qxg7 hxg5 20.Qxh8+. Black is material down and his position is a mess. There is no way he is going to survive this against a player like Bareev. 20...Ke7 21.Rc4 Qd8 22.Qg7 Be6 23.Rb1 Rb8 24.Qxg5+ Ke8 25.Bc6+.

Taking the bishop loses the queen (25...bxc6 26.Rxb8 Qxb8 27.Qg8+ Kd7 28.Qxb8), so Morozevich is forced to resort to desperate measures: 25...Kf8. But this is even worse: 26.Qh6+ Ke7. Now Fritz is screaming for mate: 27.Rxb7+ Rxb7 28.Qg5+ Kf8 29.Qxd8+ Kg7 30.Qg5+ Kf8 31.Rh4 Bd4 32.Qd8+ Kg7 33.Qh8+ Kg6 34.Qh6+ Kf5 35.Rh5+ Kg4 36.Qg5#. Bareev line leads to a similarly certain demise: 27...Kf8 28.Rxb7 Kg7 29.Rxb8 Qxb8 30.Qg5+ Kf8 31.Qh6+ Kg8 32.Rh4 Qb2 33.Qg5+ 1-0.

Current standings

Previous Results

Links

• Official web site of the event
• All games so far in PGN