Women’s World Championship update

The Women’s World Championship in Tehran is nearing its climax with one finalist already known – GM Anna Muzychuk of Ukraine. Her sister, Mariya, who chose not to enter as a result of  the hijab controversy, said that she respected her sister’s decision to take part as it had always been her dream to be world champion. In football terms she is now only one game away from achieving this but in this tournament that one game might in reality be nine….If she has any advantage over her opponent in the final, it will be in the number of games played. In none of her matches hitherto has Anna been stretched beyond the classical format including a 2-0 victory in the semi-final. On the other hand, one of her possible opponents, WGM Tan Zhongyi of China, has already played twenty-one games of various lengths including victory in an armageddon finish in Round 2 and a 1.5-0.5 win over the favourite Ju Wenjun in the quarter-final. Her semi-final match with GM Harika Dronavalli of India is tied at 1-1 after the two classical games. Harika herself has had no easier time, having played twenty games so far with the prospect of another possible seven before either player reaches the final. On that basis you have to fancy Anna’s chances although you can’t question Harika’s resilience. Having lost the first game in the semi-final and knowing a draw in the second would not be enough, she was faced with having to win a knight and bishop ending.  If you want to see how to achieve this but don’t fancy playing through 162 moves, you might want to start the following game at White’s move 116 when Black gives up her last piece and the fun begins.

White:   Harika Dronavalli (2539)   Black:  Tan Zhongyi (2502)       

Women’s World Championship 2017

FIDE Grand Prix

Rather like London buses, you wait for a decent tournament and then two come along at once. As Round 3 in the Women’s World Chess Championship is almost complete, the first leg of the FIDE Grand Prix has begun in Sharjah.  This competition is divided into four separate tournaments, the other three to be held in Moscow, Geneva and Majorca later in the year. The finer details lack clarity in the eyes of this correspondent who would welcome any available explanation.  Twenty-four players have been selected and each will play in three of the four tournaments. The two players with the most points at the end qualify for the Candidates Tournament next year to select a challenger for the next World Championship. Eighteen are playing at Sharjah and as 4 x 18 = 72, all twenty-four players will have played in three tournaments at the end of the cycle.  So far, so good. However, the official website lists only twenty-two players and does not include Hou Yifan who is currently playing at Sharjah. (Wei Yi is included but is not playing at Sharjah.) Are the two extra places left for ‘wild cards’? Not all the players regard the nine-round Swiss format as a ‘new, exciting format’ as described by FIDE on their site as with such a high-quality field there are no easy games from the start which might explain the high percentage of draws in Round 1.

Meanwhile, for those who like complicated tournaments, the Women’s World Championship should suit you. There are three preliminary rounds followed by four quarter-finals, two semi-finals and the final. The first two rounds whittled the players down from 64 to 32 and then 16 in Round 3.  Tomorrow (Sunday) Round 3 will conclude and the last eight will begin their quarter-finals on Monday. Each match consists of two classic chess games followed, if necessary, by two 25 min + 10-sec increment rapid games, then if needed two additional 10+10 games, two 5+3 blitz games and finally a single Armageddon game, where White has 5 minutes to Black’s 4, but a draw counts as a win for Black. Not everyone is happy with the format and there have been many adverse comments posted online but this is why nine days have been set aside for the quarter-finals. While some of the early games posed few problems for the stronger players, Round 3 has proved tougher and four of the eight matches go to tie-breaks on Sunday. Watch this space. In Round 2 two games went to an Armageddon finish with one ending in a draw which meant that Black wins. The unluckiest player was probably WGM Natalyia Buksa of Ukraine who only needed a draw against IM Sopiko Guramishvili of Georgia in the second 10-minute rapidplay game to go through to Round 3. With K + R v K + R + N, she must have felt confident as the seconds ticked away. However, with only 1m 38 secs left on her clock, Black played the following move: 125….Rg2+

White, understandably, thought that was it and made the meaningless move 126.Kxe3?? before resigning after 126…Rxa2. What she missed, though, was that 126.Ke1! still draws, since 126…Rxa2 is stalemate! The first of the blitz games was drawn but Sopiko went on to win the second and go through to Round 3 and she is still there going into Sunday’s tie-breaks.

Women’s World Chess Championship

                                 Ju Wenjun

The 2017 Women’s World Chess Championship began in Tehran on February 11 and continues until March 3. 63 players are taking part in a six-round knockout tournament that has been surrounded by controversy since it was announced that all players would have to wear the hijab, leading to the refusal of several players to take part. Top seed, fresh from her triumph at the Tradewise Gibraltar Masters where she won the women’s first prize, is Ju Wenjun. If she can add the $60,000 first prize to the £15,000 she won in Gibraltar, it would make it a terrific start to 2017 for her. The odd number of players is explained by the death of the Romanian women’s chess champion, Cristina-Adela Foisor, last month. She has not been replaced and her opponent in round one has been given a bye.

Second seed in the competition is Anna Muzychuk of Ukraine who also had a fine tournament at Gibraltar, scoring 6/10, although her sister Maria, a former women’s world champion, is one of the absentees, saying that in her opinion “it’s absolutely obvious that Iran isn’t a suitable country for such a prestigious event.” An alternative view was understandably offered by the Iranian WGM Mitra Hejazipour, who said: “This is going to be the biggest sporting event women in Iran have ever seen; we haven’t been able to host any world championship in other sporting fields for women in the past. It’s not right to call for a boycott. These games are important for women in Iran; it’s an opportunity for us to show our strength.”  Unfortunately, we shall not be seeing any more of the strength of Iranian women’s chess for now as all three home players have already been eliminated.

The current world champion, Hou Yifan, is also absent from Tehran owing to her objection to the arrangements. Her mood at Gibraltar and bizarre protest in the final round may have had something to do with this defeat in Round 6 to her new rival and the favourite to take her crown.                                  

White:   Hou Yifan (2651)   Black:  Ju Wenjun (2583)       

Tradewise Gibraltar Masters 2017

Gibraltar rocked!

Hikaru Nakamura

While congratulations go to Hikaru Nakamura for his victory in the Tradewise Gibraltar Masters – and commiserations to the unlucky runner-up, David Anton Gujarro after a play-off – the sensational news from Gibraltar today was not a victory by anyone but a defeat….and a deliberate one.  In what GM Stuart Conquest described as ‘the biggest crisis to hit chess in fifteen years’ (why fifteen? what happened in 2002?), our favourite female Chinese GM, Hou Yifan, amazed everyone in her final match by resigning after five moves. This was no blunder as you will see from the details below. In an interview afterwards Hou Yifan said that she was ‘upset’ at having been drawn against seven women in the first nine rounds and felt that this was not fair on the other women players although it did not do Ju Wenjun any harm as she won the women’s first prize of £15,000, beating Hou Yifan on the way.  The tournament organiser, Brian Callaghan, was sympathetic but pointed out that the draw is done by computer and that was the way it turned out.  I suspect we have not heard the last of this.

White:   Hou Yifan (2651)   Black:  Lalith Babu (2587)       

Tradewise Gibraltar Masters 2017

 

Tradewise Gibraltar Masters

Congratulations to Wesley So who has added victory in the Tata Steel Masters to his success at London and the Chess Grand Tour. Over fifty games unbeaten – where will it end? Well, Broadstairs’ favourite grandmaster, Wei Yi, had a good go yesterday in the penultimate round where victory would have put him in the driving seat. After an interesting start where Wei Yi had a slight advantage but with isolated pawns, the game evened out and a draw was agreed. This followed victory for Wei Yi on Friday in only 31 moves against the World Championship runner-up, Sergey Karjakin. There was an amusing finish to this game for those following online where the result was initially given as a draw with Wei Yi in a clearly won position. Presumably, the chap pressing the button misunderstood the handshake between the two players and had not seen the position. Sadly, Wei Yi lost his last game today – only his second defeat in the tournament – but his final position of joint third was a tremendous result against some of the best in the world for a player who is still only seventeen.

                         Nigel Short

Meanwhile, attention now turns to the Tradewise Gibraltar Masters which, according to the Financial Times is “the strongest and best-organised event of its kind in the world”. Certainly, most of the world’s top players who were not at Wijk aan Zee are taking part in the 250-player ten-round Open which has just completed its sixth round. Hikaru Nakamura, Fabiano Caruana and MVL (Maxime Vachier Lagrave) are all competing for the £23,000 first prize and Hou Yifan is hoping to win the £15,000 for the top woman. British interest rests on the shoulders of Michael Adams, David Howell and Nigel Short. With four rounds to go, Adams shares the lead with Nakamura and David Anton Guijarro of Spain. However, Short is only half a point behind after a terrific win today against Caruana, the world number three, that must have brought back memories of his battles with Kasparov all those years ago.

White:   Nigel Short (2684)   Black:  Fabiano Caruana (2816)       

Tradewise Gibraltar Masters 2017