Super Final R11: Kasparov wins title by 1½ points

57th Russian Championship Super Final November 14th – December 1st 2004

The Super Final of the 57th Russian was held in the Festive Hall of the Hotel Rossija (“Rociya”), directly adjacent to the Red Square. The prize sum was US $125,000, to be paid out in rouble equivalent. The winner took $50,000. The participants of this round robin tournament were Garry Kasparov, Alexander Morozevich, Alexander Grischuk, Peter Svidler, Evgeny Bareev, Alexey Dreev, Vitaly Tseshkovsky, Alexander Motylev, Vladimir Epishin, Artem Timofeev and Alexey Korotylev.

Round eleven – Saturday, November 27, 2004

Two games were drawn today: a Caro-Kann between Timofeev and Epishin which ended after 29 moves with a R+B vs R+B with each side still having six pawns on the board; and the Sicilian Najdorf between the two leading players Kasparov (black) and Grischuk. The novelty came from Grischuk on move 15, and about ten moves later he had a clear advantage. Although the young Super-GM pushed hard he was unable to overcome the black defence and the game ended after 39 moves in a draw.

Morozevich vs Motylev was a King's Indian Panno and relatively balanced until move 21.

Morozevich,A (2758) - Motylev,A (2651) [E62]
57th ch-RUS Moscow RUS (11), 27.11.2004
1.c4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.g3 Bg7 4.Bg2 0-0 5.0-0 d6 6.Nc3 Nc6 7.d4 Rb8 8.h3 a6 9.e4 b5 10.cxb5 axb5 11.Re1 Nd7 12.Be3 Na5 13.b3 c5 14.Rc1 c4 15.b4 Nc6 16.a3 e5 17.d5 Ne7 18.a4 bxa4 19.Qxa4 f5 20.Ng5 Nb6 21.Qa7

The only way Black can defend his rook is with 21...Bd7. Motylev played 21...Rb7?, after which White had 22.Ne6, and now 22...Rxa7 leads to 23.Nxd8 Rd7 24.Bxb6 to the loss of a piece. However Morozevich played 22.Bxb6 Qxb6 23.Qxb6 Rxb6 24.b5 without anything tangible. The game continued 24...Bh6 25.h4 Bd7 26.Ra1 Bxg5 27.hxg5 Bxb5 28.Ra7 Nc8 29.Rc7 Ba6 30.Ra1 Rf7 31.Rc6 Bb7 32.Rxc4 Rb2 33.Nd1 Rb3 34.Ne3 Nb6 35.Rcc1

35...Kg7? 36.Rab1 Rxb1 37.Rxb1 Na4 38.Nc4 Nc3 39.Rb6 Na4 40.Rb4 Nc5 41.Nxd6 Rd7 42.Ne8+ 1-0.

Bareev outplayed Korotylev in a Classical Nimzo Indian and picked up the full point after 58 moves. Svidler vs Dreev was a Richter Rauzer in which the trouble started at move 27:

Svidler,P (2735) - Dreev,A (2698) [B61]
57th ch-RUS Moscow RUS (11), 27.11.2004
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 Nf6 4.Nc3 cxd4 5.Nxd4 Nc6 6.Bg5 Bd7 7.Qd2 Rc8 8.Nxc6 Bxc6 9.f3 a6 10.0-0-0 e6 11.Ne2 Be7 12.h4 Bb5 13.Nd4 Bxf1 14.Rhxf1 h6 15.Be3 Nd7 16.h5 Ne5 17.b3 d5 18.exd5 Qxd5 19.Kb1 b5 20.g4 Nc6 21.Qc1 0-0 22.Nf5 Qe5 23.Bf4 Qc3 24.Rd3 Qa5 25.Nxe7+ Nxe7 26.g5 Nd5

27.Bd2! Nc3+ 28.Rxc3 Rxc3 29.gxh6 b4 30.hxg7 Rd8 31.Bxc3 bxc3.

32.h6. Svidler missed the attractive 32.Qh6! f6 33.Qh8+ Kf7 34.Qh7 Rg8 35.Rd1 Qc7 36.Qg6+ Ke7 37.h6 with 38.h7 to follow and win the game. But it would have been gilding the lily, since White still has a winning position. 32...Qe5 33.Rd1 Rxd1 34.Qxd1 Qf6 35.Qh1 (or 35.Qd6 threatening 36.Sf8+ Kh7 37.g8Q#) 35...Kh7 36.Qg1 Qd8 37.g8Q+ and Black resigned. The reason is that after 37...Qxg8 38.Qxg8+ Kxg8 White marches forward with his a and b-pawns, e.g. 39.b4 Kh7 40.a4 Kxh6 41.b5 axb5 42.axb5 and White gets a new queen. 1-0.

Final standings

FIDE vs Performance rating in this tournament

It is interesting to compare the FIDE rating of each player with his performance in the tournament. The performance rating is what the player should have been rated to achieve his final score. For instance the winner Garry Kasparov is currently rated 2813. His final score was higher than could be statistically expected of a player of this rating. It would be normal for a player rated 2855 (2813 + 42 in the cross table above).

As you can see Kasparov, Grischuk, Dreev and Motylev played better than their ratings, while Morozevich (–88!), Svidler and Bareev did worse that could have been expected. At the lower end Epishin, Korotylev and Timofeev, who all scored less than 50%, still played better than expected. Tseshkovsky, the nominally weakest player, performed much worse than expected. Note that the performance rating is not the one that will appear in the next rating list – a player must achieve it a number of times for it to become his FIDE rating.

Draw watch

The final tally of this tournament shows a remarkably low draw quota: just 29 of 55 games ended without a decision. This works out to 54%, as opposed to the normal rate of 60-70%. White won a total of 17 games (= 30%), Black scored in 9 games (= 16%).

Note that Kasparov drew 50% of his games (the 50% that were decided all went in his favour). Grischuk drew 60%, Dreev 50%, and Morozevich 60%. Vladimir Epishin holds the record with 90% of his games drawn, while Vital Tseshkovsky drew only 30%, but lost 60% and won 10%.

There was one game, Dreev vs Grischuk in round three, that lasted just ten moves. Timofeev-Bareev in round 7 lasted 17 moves and can hardly be considered a fought-out game. 13 drawn games lasted 20-29 moves; the longest draws, all three involving Motylev on the black side, were in 76, 78 kand 84 moves. In the following chart you see the number of games that were played with 10, 17, 20, 21 (one each), 22 (two games), etc.

All Results

• All games in zipped PGN
• All reports so far