Armenia & Georgia happy, Ukraine not so much

While several videos have emerged on the internet showing Armenians and Georgians celebrating and cheering, after their best chess players won gold at the Olympiad in Dresden, Ukraine is less happy. They worry about their best player Vassily Ivanchuk, who refused a doping test, and to make matters worse their Gaprindashvili Cup was broken and its diamond stolen. Read more

Robert G. Wade dies at 87

Bob Wade, International Master, arbiter, journalist, coach, organiser, writer, archivist and foremost, chess lover, died this morning from pneumonia. He had been in the Elisabeth Hospital in Woolwich for three days for complications from a common cold. Wade was 87 years old. Read more

Weekly Endgame Study (98)

Every Saturday (not last week; our apologies) an endgame study is published at ChessVibes, selected by IM Yochanan Afek: player, trainer, endgame study composer and writer. A week later the solution is published. Good luck with the instructional occupation of solving a study! Read more

Romanishin wins 13th Cultural Village

Oleg Romanishin has won he 13th Cultural Village Chess Tournament. The Ukrainian veteran finished on 6.5/9, ahead of Vyacheslav Ikonnikov and Deepan Chakkravarthy. By winning, Romanishin qualified for Corus Grandmaster group C. Read more

From Dresden straight to the Bundesliga

If you’re not fed up yet with top level games after the Olympiad, and you don’t have too much to do this weekend, we have good news for you. A new Bundesliga weekend is ahead of us, and you can follow many Olympiad participants live again. Read more

Judit Polgar (13) verovert Amsterdam: MATTEN 5

MATTEN nr. 5 is uit!

In dit nummer vindt u:
— hoe de 13-jarige Judit Polgar in Amsterdam vijf volwassen grootmeesters van het bord veegde;
— schaker Ton Timman: levenslang broer van;
— de moord op IM Sergey Nikolaev;
— Ton Sijbrands in Bonn: een wereldkampioen over Anand - Kramnik;
— de geniale David Bronstein: herinneringen van Tom Fürstenberg;
— een angstvallig geheimgehouden plot;
— Viktor de Verschrikkelijke is nu 77 jaar oud;
— de worsteling van Karel van der Weide.

Dit alles (en veel meer) op 128 pagina’s voor slechts € 11,95!

“MATTEN lost de begin 2007 gewekte verwachtingen volledig in”, schreef Het Parool eerder dit jaar. Iets voor Sinterklaas?

Alle goede boekhandels verkopen MATTEN, en elke boekhandel in Nederland kan het binnen 48 uur voor u in huis hebben.

U kunt MATTEN 5 ook rechtstreeks hier bestellen.

2nd Grand Slam Final & Candidates Tournament

The dates for the 2nd Bilbao Grand Slam Final have been announced: 2-15 September 2009. Meanwhile there are more details available about the planned FIDE Candidates Tournament. A wrap-up of this and other news. Read more

Armenia and Georgia win gold at Olympiad

Armenia repeated their Olympic success of two years ago in Turin by winning gold at the 38th Olympiad in Dresden as well. Georgia, led by former world champion Chiburdanidze, won gold in the women’s section. Final report with games, results, standings, prize giving and a video the full press conference given by the Armenian team. Read more

Breaking: Ilyumzhinov announces Candidates Tournament

Today the General Assembly of FIDE decided on a proposal for changing the current world championship cycle. Just minutes ago FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov made public that FIDE plans to organize a Candidates Tournament, which means a radical change of the current world championship cycle. Read more

Topalov: “I don’t see a reason there should be any changes”

According to the world’s number one player, the current world championship cycle shouldn’t be changed, at least not until 2011. In a special press conference held on the last rest day of the Olympiad, Veselin Topalov shared his opinion on several subjects with the present media. Read more

Ukraine beats Israel; Poland leads women’s

In the penultimate round of the Olympiad, leader Israel lost to Ukraine; they took over the lead and share it with Armenia who beat Serbia. Poland is in clear first in the women’s section after they beat Armenia and Serbia-Ukraine shared match points. Full round 10 report with games, results, standings and a special press conference with Boris Spassky on video. Read more

New: chess predators, take notice!

We have just published a new book called The Black Lion: the Chess Predator’s Choice Against Both 1.e4 and 1.d4.

It is the second, fully revised and updated editon of The Lion, which attracted a lot of attention when it was published more than eight years ago.

It is a remarkable effort by two strong Dutch club players Jerry van Rekom and Leo Jansen, who developed this system in which Black plays d6, Nf6, Nbd7 and e5.

The system LOOKS quiet, like a sleeping lion, but White often struggles to counter Black’s ideas. The moves are easy to learn, Black has a good choice of plans, and the positions are fresh.

In short: a robust, multipurpose system, presented in an easy-to-navigate opening manual for club players.

Israel clear first after beating Armenia

Anything can happen in the decisive last two rounds of the Olympiad in Dresden after Israel surprisingly but convincingly beat Armenia. The Chinese women dropped to shared 4th after losing to Ukraine, who now share first with Poland and Serbia. Round 9 report with games, results, standings and a very interesting press conference on video.
Read more

Armenia beats France; USA women defeat Russia

Armenia swept France 3½-½ and Germany lost their first match against Israel. The Chinese ladies were held to 2-2 again, this time by Ukraine, and USA beat Russia 3-1! Round 8 report with games, results, standings and the press conference on video.
Read more

Weekly Endgame Study (97)

Every Saturday (not last week; our apologies) an endgame study is published at ChessVibes, selected by IM Yochanan Afek: player, trainer, endgame study composer and writer. A week later the solution is published. Good luck with the instructional occupation of solving a study! Read more

Doha Grand Prix cancelled, moved to Elista

Not long after the contracts for the Kamsky-Topalov match were signed, FIDE had another big event to worry about. Yesterday the third Grand Prix tournament, scheduled for 13-29 December in Doha, Qatar was suddenly cancelled. FIDE hastily moved the event to Elista and the participants have been informed this morning. Read more

Armenia beats Russia; Chinese women held by USA

In the 7th round of the Olympiad the Armenian team did very well in their efforts to win another gold medal by beating the Russian favorites 2½-1½. Still undefeated, Germany is now sharing second with Israel and France. The Chinese women dropped their first match point against the USA. Round 7 report with games, results, standings and the press conference on video. Read more

How to Beat the King’s Indian Defence?

It remains one of the most popular choices for Black versus 1.d4: the King’s Indian Defence. But how to combat it succesfully with White?

Slovakian GM Jan Markos has designed three separate repertoires for White. Each of them has a different style, ranging from solidly positional to wildly attacking:

- The Bayonet Attack (9.b4) - favoured by the elite and regarded as the critical test of the KID
- The “Korchnoi Line” (9.Ne1) - leading to wild complications and mutual attacks
- The “Krasenkow Line” (6.h3) - a strategic line with which Krasenkow has scored tremendously

Beating the KID is published by Quality Chess and gives the latest word on this popular defence, which also KID players themselves had better not miss themselves… You can find it here.

Kamsky-Topalov: contracts signed

Today the teams of Topalov and Kamsky have signed the contracts for their match, and so Sofia as the venue, and 16th to 28th February, 2009 as the dates, are now official. We have the full press conferences with Danailov (manager of Topalov) and Sutovsky (manager of Kamsky) on video. Read more

Introducing… the Olympiad

After sacrificing some good night sleep and the subsequent breakfast, I did manage to… finish the second video. Actually it should have been the first since it’s a big introduction to the Olympiad, featuring many famous players involved in their 6th round here in Dresden. Enjoy! Read more

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