‘Experience’ bounce back with 3½-1½ win over ‘Rising Stars’
Total score at halftime: Experience-Rising Stars 13½-11½
In Round 5 of the NH Chess Tournament the Experience team bounced back with a 3½- 1½ win over the Rising Stars. Russian Champion Peter Svidler defeated American Champion Hikaru Nakamura, while Alexander Beliasvky won his first game at the expense of Daniel Stellwagen. Halfway through the event the Experience team leads 13½-11½. In the fight for the ticket to the 2010 Amber Blindfold and Rapid Tournament in Nice, Dutch Champion Jan Smeets is leading with 3½ from 5, a full point ahead of runners-up Fabiano Caruana and Hikaru Nakamura.
The key game of the day was the one between Peter Svidler and Hikaru Nakamura, the leaders of the Experience team and the Rising Stars. For a while they followed the game they played last month in San Sebastian until the American deviated. Nakamura got a satisfactory position, but then the health problems that have been plaguing him from the start of the tournament began to play tricks on him. A series of lesser moves was capped by 22…g3 after which the top-seed of the Rising Stars was simply lost. Svidler was pleased by his move 24.e6 and although he felt that the conversion of his advantage had not been perfect he scored an important win after 61 moves. ‘I got there in the end and that was all that mattered. A good result before the rest day’, as he commented on his win. The Russian Champion also revealed that the day before yesterday ‘a monkey had been taken off his back’. Finally he could play freely now that ‘the Ashes’ are over, the cricket test matches between Australia and England, which ‘his team’, the English had won.
Peter Heine Nielsen didn’t go for anything wild in his game against tactical wizard Hou Yifan, but opted for a strategic battle with a Catalan Opening. The Chinese vice-World Champion came well prepared, improved on an earlier game she had played and reached a comfortable position. Perhaps Black was even a tiny bit better at some point, but Hou Yifan and her coach Yu Shaoteng opined that the equilibrium had never been broken. When they were asked how they assessed the draw that came about after 37 moves, they smiled and unanimously said ‘solid’!
Here is the full report.
Team score after 5 rounds: Experience 13½ – Rising stars 11½
Experience individual score
Svidler 3½
Ljubojevic 3
Nielsen 3
Van Wely 2½
Beliavsky 1½
Rising Stars individual score
Smeets 3½
Caruana 2½
Nakamura 2½
Hou Yifan 2
Stellwagen 1
Pitiful score for the rising stars.