The Very Latest Developments
Welcome to the October 2002 Update!Most of the top-level games this last month came from tournaments with relatively quick time controls, such as the European Rapid & Blitz Championship which took place in Crete, and the Cap D'Agde event, and this seems to be becoming more and more prevalent. Whatever the merits of such tournaments from a spectators viewpoint, objectively the standard of chess suffers enormously (I believe Neil has discussed this in the past on his French site). I was surprised at the number of blunders from top-flight players this month. Here is just one, extreme example: this position was reached after White's 26th move in the game between Malakhov,V - Bacrot,E, two 2650+ GMs:
Black is in a bad way, it is true, but compounded things somewhat by playing 26...Kxe6?? allowing his opponent a simple mate in 2 starting 27 Bd5+!, which White missed!! When I showed this position at the local Chess Café the local players took all of one second to find it! TonyK |
All this month's new games are easily downloaded in PGN format using ChessPub.exe, but to download the October '02 Flank Openings games directly in PGN form click here: 
English Opening
1...e5
[A23]: This time last year the German player Miltner surprised me by playing ...Na6 instead of ...d5 in a Keres System, and since then I had been hoping to see a decent example between two GMs.
In fact in Miezis,N - Zapata,A White plays a quick Nc3 and the following position is reached:
                    
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So in the annotations I consider this move-order, and my preferred 2 g3.
[A28]: Ehlvest,J - Harikrishna,P is a nice example of Nimzovitch's system with 4 e4, one of my favourites, and yet more fuel for my theory that Black should prefer 4...Bc5!
[A28]: I hadn't previously considered the possibility of 4 d3, which is a move I have used a couple of times, on this site, as I don't think it is very good!
 
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The game Gritsak,O - Sokolov,I is a must-see for two reasons, but mostly for Black's aggressive opening set-up, which is worth copying.
[A29]: The aforementioned Malakhov,V - Bacrot,E game features the Four Knights Variation with 4 g3 g6!?, a favourite of Black's.
1...c5
[A32]: Blagojevic,D - Akopian,V poses the question: which is more important, the bishop pair, or being able to castle? It also features a very original and strong knight manoeuvre from Black and a powerful light-squared attack.
[A34]: In Eingorn,V - Van Wely,L, following 1 c4 c5 2 Nf3 Nf6 3 Nc3 d5 4 cxd5 Nxd5 White plays the unusual 5 Qa4+
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But Black equalises easily, only to make another of those one-move blunders.
Réti
[A07]: One of the major shocks from the World Cup tournament, in Hyderabad, India, was the game Sasikiran,K - Anand,V, where the older player came a cropper, although his play was certainly not up to his normal standard.
It is a shame that Anand decided not to play for India in the Olympiad, as with both him and the other strong young Indian GMs they would have a team capable of getting in amongst the medals.
[A11]: At the Cap D'Agde tournament the anti-Slav system 1 c4 c6 2 Nf3 d5 3 e3 Nf6 4 Qc2!?
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was very popular, and this was not just because the variation's chief promoter, Misha Gurevich, was playing, as others tried it, too.
Anyway, all these games are rounded-up in Gurevich,M - Bareev,E.
e-mails
Don't forget to pop over to my October E-mailbag!
Please feel free to share any of your thoughts with me, whatever they are, suggestions, criticisms (just the polite ones, please), etc. Drop me a line at tonykosten@chesspublishing.com
Till next month, Tony K