Jon Speelman: Ructions in Romania

by Jonathan Speelman
4/11/2025 – The 2024 European Chess Championship in Romania drew nearly 400 players and concluded with Matthias Bluebaum claiming the title for a second time. Across eleven rounds, the tournament offered no shortage of drama and complexity. In this article, two games from the event are examined - both notable for their sharp conclusions and instructive endgame moments. Light annotations in the openings are followed by deeper analysis of the critical late-stage play. | Pictured: Mahammad Muradli from Azerbaijan (FIDE)

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A beautiful clean style

[Note that Jon Speelman also looks at the content of the article in video format, here embedded at the end of the article.]

The recent European Championship in Romania, won by Matthias Bluebaum for a second time, was a massive affair with over a hundred grandmasters in a field of nearly four hundred. Over the course of the eleven rounds they contested something over two thousand games and I watched a number of these, mostly in fairly desultory fashion but taking more notice when the engine metaphorically beeped, suddenly changing value dramatically.

Today I'm going to look at two of these games, which near their conclusion throw up some very interesting analysis. I've put some light notes in the openings (neither of which is in my repertoire) and then concentrated on melees which arose at the end. I'm taking them in chronological order.

Aydin Suleymanli

Aydin Suleymanli

Select an entry from the list to switch between games



In this video course, experts including Dorian Rogozenco, Mihail Marin, Karsten Müller and Oliver Reeh, examine the games of Boris Spassky. Let them show you which openings Spassky chose to play, where his strength in middlegames were and much more.


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Jonathan Speelman, born in 1956, studied mathematics but became a professional chess player in 1977. He was a member of the English Olympic team from 1980–2006 and three times British Champion. He played twice in Candidates Tournaments, reaching the semi-final in 1989. He twice seconded a World Championship challenger: Nigel Short and then Viswanathan Anand against Garry Kasparov in London 1993 and New York 1995.
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