News release
Sunday 11th December 2011
LONDON CHESS CLASSIC 2011: ROUND 8
John Saunders reports:
Vlad The Anglocide
There was just one decisive result in the penultimate round: Vladimir Kramnik broke English hearts by beating home player Luke McShane in a long, fluctuating struggle. That put the former world champion two points clear of the field. He has White in the final round and is not someone who is readily beatable with that colour. And in order for Vlad not to finish first (at least on tie-break), something would have to happen that has never happened before at a classical time control: Levon Aronian would have to beat him with Black in tomorrow’s final round.
Let’s run through a few possible last-round permutations. If Vlad wins, of course he takes the title and the 50,000 Euros first prize. If he draws, and Magnus Carlsen fails to win (he’s Black against Nigel Short), the same applies. If Vlad draws and Magnus wins, then Vlad is first on tie-break (an extra Black win) but they receive 37,500 Euros each. If Vlady loses, Magnus could jump over him to take first, or if he fails too, Luke McShane can even finish first ahead of Vlad on tie-break (if he beats Vishy) as can Hikaru Nakamura (after a play-off, if he beats Mickey Adams). The upshot of this is that all four boards tomorrow feature a player who has a chance (albeit remote) of first place.
It’s a shame I used my Jack in the Beanstalk pantomime joke in the round five report because, as it turns out, Vlad Kramnik (and not Hikaru Nakamura) was the Giant after all. Today Vlad completed his sweep of the four English players. Luke put up a grand fight, not just to draw but to win, but in the end an extreme case of time trouble was his undoing. Luke fought right through the next time control but it always looked forlorn.
David Howell completed his quota of eight games with a draw with Levon Aronian after a long struggle. Tomorrow he reappears as a commentator. Aronian tried what is an unusual opening for him – the Pirc. (Which far too many British chessplayers pronounce ‘perk’ – one of my pet hates! It is more like ‘peerts’.) This was a very good effort by David Howell against the world number three and allowed him to finish on, if not a ‘high’, at least a ‘medium high’.
The first game to finish was Anand-Carlsen, which was drawn after 33 moves. It started life as a Queen’s Gambit Declined, Tartakower Variation. It followed theory for about 17 moves and then a number of pieces were exchanged, coming down to a fairly arid position, with rook and knight each and symmetrical pawns. “Not your most exciting game ever,” said Lawrence Trent to the players. “It had its moments,” replied Vishy, good-humouredly.
The last game to finish was Nakamura-Short, which started with an English Opening and a Dutch flavour (…f7-f5 being played), not unlike the game Carlsen-Nakamura from last year (which ended in a draw). Before long, the pawns locked across the board like a World War One trench system. They said of that war that it would be “over by Christmas” but Mickey Adams took a look at this game and commented “this could last forever!” With draw offers illegal under the Classic rules, it was a worrying point. A couple of pawns were exchanged at move 31 but it made little difference. A pair of rooks were exchanged at move 73 but that didn’t change anything either. Thankfully the players repeated positions at move 90 and an armistice was signed.
FIDE Open
The last round proved fruitful for India but barren for the home nation. Top seed GM Abhijeet Gupta beat Keith Arkell to secure the first prize with 8/9. IM Sahaj Grover, also of India, finished second on his own with 7½ after beating Peter Wells. Completing the English misery, IM Arghyadip Das beat Jovanka Houska and thus deprived her of a GM norm. Third place was shared by Gawain Jones, Tiger Hillarp Persson, Arghyadip Das, Aaron Summerscale and Lorin D’Costa with 7. Tom Weber of Luxembourg achieved an IM norm.
Jovanka Houska’s quest for a full GM norm came to a tragic end. Her time will come.
Women’s Invitational
The two leaders, IM Dagne Ciuksyte of England and WIM Guliskhan Nakhbayeva of Kazakhstan, both won to score 7½/9 and share first place. For the Kazakh player it brought a WGM norm.
No Name Win Draw Loss Pts / games Tie break Rating TPR
1 Kramnik Vladimir 4 3 0 15 / 7 2800 2963
2 Carlsen Magnus 3 4 0 13 / 7 2826 2902
3 McShane Luke J 3 3 1 12 / 7 3 black wins 2671 2852
4 Nakamura Hikaru 3 3 1 12 / 7 1 black win 2758 2851
5 Anand Viswanathan 1 5 1 8 / 7 black win 2811 2750
6 Aronian Levon 1 5 1 8 / 7 white win 2802 2733
7 Short Nigel D 1 2 4 5 / 7 2698 2586
8 Howell David W L 0 4 4 4 / 8 2633 2570
9 Adams Michael 0 3 4 3 / 7 2734 2519
The scores above are ‘absolute’, i.e. they make no allowance for the three players who have played fewer games. My unofficial ‘relative’ scores (using a golf-style formula but in reverse: +2 for a win, 1 for a loss, draws don’t count): 1 Kramnik +8, 2 Carlsen +6, 3 McShane +5, 4 Nakamura +5, 5 Anand +1, 6 Aronian +1, 7 Short -2, 8-9 Adams, Howell -4.
Round 9 starts on Monday 12 December at the earlier time of 1200 UK time. David Howell will be joining the commentary team for a session.
For more information and to buy tickets to the London Chess Classic, please go to www.londonchessclassic.com –
He’s amazing.