Rising Stars win again, with some luck
27 August 2008 22:27 PM CET | Last modified: 22:31 | By Peter Doggers | Filed under: Reports | Tags:
In the seventh round of the NH Chess Tournament the Rising Stars further increased their lead over the Experience team thanks to a somewhat lucky 3-2 win. Particularly Viktor Kortchnoi had good reason to be unhappy when he lost on time in a winning position, against Fabiano Caruana.
Again Korchnoi attracted all the attention today but this time not in a very positive way. He had been in severe timetrouble, and just when his opponent Fabiano Caruana blundered an exchange, Korchnoi lost on time. He then said to his 16-year-old opponent: “You never will play chess!” All the more surprising since earlier in the tournament, the 77-year-old had been quite positive about Caruana’s play.
But the Experience team did score a victory today: Evgeny Bareev took revenge for his second-round loss against Stellwagen. It was quite a nice ending, and some of its finer details will be explained in my video of this round, scheduled to be published tomorrow.
Poor Ljubojevic is shaking his head more and more during his games, as he just doesn’t understand his own play anymore. Yesterday he was thinking for an hour about meeting Wang Yue’s 19.e4 with 19…Bf4 followed by 20…g5 and 21…Nh5, but when the Chinese played the move instantly, for some reason Ljubo took it without thinking. “I didn’t sleep well because I kept on asking myself why,” he said to me. Today, against Erwin L’Ami, he added another strange decision to his list: exposing his king far too much, just to win back a pawn he was strongly blockading anyway.
The Chinese locomotive was finally stopped, by the member of the Experience team who’s playing not bad at all in Amsterdam: Simen Agdestein. Wang Yue did try it for a long time, and yes, he had a slight plus, but this time his Experienced opponent just did not collapse.
Before all this Jussupow had again drawn his game quickly, against Cheparinov, who is still in the race for the Amber ticket thanks to Wang Yue’s draw.
The score is now 24½-10½ for the Rising Stars team:
| Rising Stars | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | Wang Yue | g | CHN | 2704 | 6½ | ||||
| 2. | Cheparinov, Ivan | g | BUL | 2687 | 5½ | ||||
| 3. | Caruana, Fabiano | g | ITA | 2630 | 5 | ||||
| 4. | L’Ami, Erwin | g | NED | 2610 | 4 | 5. | Stellwagen, Daniël | g | NED | 2616 | 3½ |
| Total | 24½ | ||||||||
| Experience | |||||||||
| 1. | Agdestein, Simen | g | NOR | 2583 | 3 | ||||
| 3. | Bareev, Evgeny | g | RUS | 2655 | 2½ | ||||
| 2. | Korchnoi, Viktor | g | SUI | 2602 | 2 | ||||
| 4. | Ljubojevic, Ljubomir | g | SRB | 2555 | 1½ | ||||
| 5. | Jussupow, Artur | g | GER | 2587 | 1½ | ||||
| Total | 10½ | ||||||||
Here are the games of the seventh round:
Links:
Korchnoi has an enormous ego and can’t stand losing - nor can he deal with it. It says nothing about Caruana.
There’s the famous scene where Korchnoi loses against Sofia Polgar and can’t take it: http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=TxeiGipoFSE.
I know a story about Korchnoi playing a simultan against a kid (like 8 years old or such) and the kid went on playing in a totally lost position (you know, kids do that sometimes) . Korchnoi apparently thought that was blasphemy, so at some point he just knocked down the kid’s king with his hand and declared to the kid “You lost!”.
Needless to say the kid’s reaction wasn’t happy (I don’t know what he did, but me as a boy would have probably run away crying).
I have no particular problems with Korchnoi and I do not particulary like Caruana when I see him in Interviews, so I’m not trying to gossip. But the story was told me from somebody I know who said that he himself was the kid (but don’t worry, he still plays chess- although he said it was a trauma for him at the time).
Pity, Korchnoi seems like somebody really intelligent and charismatic…but respect for others is something not linked to intelligence or charisma unfortunately.
@Michel83: I agree with you. I don’t really like Caruana myself, he seems a bit arrogant in a way.
Yes, the great Viktor also was mad when playing vs. a Mexican IM Julian Estrada. Korchnoi was ahead on material, but the mexican IM did not resign because he saw that Korchnoi might get into time trouble, which he did. After all Korchnoi lost on time and he started blaming the mexican for his unsporting attitude of not resigning!. I love Korchnoi play, but he gets carried away…maybe that it why he is a legend, but still I agree that it is not good. An apology to Caruana will be in place.
Congratulations for the great videos!!!
@ Buri
I am not to one of those pathetic people insulting players on the Internet, but good to see I am not alone having this impression of Caruana. I won’t write more, but I don’t have much sympathy for the boy (and I never see him smile…). But as long as he behaves (not like Korchnoi, what a shame! Did he actually ever apologize to anybody for his disrespectful rushs of emotion?), well, I do not care.
Please guys, let’s not discuss these old matters for the umpteenth time. Korchnoi is a living legend and, like all legends, he has the right to some eccentricity. Besides, these are just a handful of incidents in a career that stretches over 55 years of intensive love for the game. And if you’re really interested in his philosophy and his view on life and chess, read his book ‘Anti chess’ before judging him.
It would not surprise me if Korchnoi had some sort of medical condition, such as Asperger’s, Autism, ADHD or whatever. But it doesn’t really matter in any case, especially given that even if Korchnoi did have such a condition, it would be no excuse for his egotistic, arrogant and sometimes even neurotic behaviour.
@Arne, don’t mistake eccentricity for bad manners. I admire Korchnoi to death, but don’t forget that Caruana is still a kid. It’s kind of cheap to bully a kid.
Korchnoi often apologises the day after one of his outbursts. The apologies just don’t get any coverage. He’s just so focussed on the game that he can’t behave normally , especially after a loss, until he has time to calm down.
Such an apology would certainly get coverage over here, so let’s see what happens today. Meanwhile, it’s interesting to mention that an hour after the game, Mr. Korchnoi repeated his outburst to one of the journalists here, before he could even ask for it. Apparently the distinguished gentleman didn’t want to be misquoted.
Karpov didn’t have this temper. Karpov won their matches and was the champion.
Read in Karpov autobiography about Korchnoi. He’s always been like this.
I agree it’s not the most polite behaviour of Korchnoi, but I wonder how many of his ‘critics’ show the exact same behaviour - anonymously - on ICC or other sites.
Well, we have to congatulate Caruana, it’s not everybody who gets insulted like that by Korchnoi. Mikhail Tal wrote in his autobiography that K. had called him “a highly routine player”, K. once said Anand “played just for tricks”, I’m sure there are many similar comments by K. about Karpov… Looks like Caruana might be World Champion one day!
Here is an excerpt from an old article about Teimour Radjabov, which shows again that Korchnoi has always had problems accepting losses. Looks like he has emotional problems
*Quote*
Teymur has had several encounters with the famous Russian chess player Victor Korchnoi, especially during Korchnoi’s visit to Baku in 1997. Teymur’s father recalls: “Victor Korchnoi came to Baku in 1997 at the invitation of the Azerbaijan Chess Federation to give Master Classes to the best junior players in Azerbaijan, including Teymur. Towards the end of his visit, Korchnoi organized a competition between the children and himself. When he played against Teymur, he lost one of the games, 3-1.
“Korchnoi jumped up, came up to me, complaining: ‘I won’t play with Teymur anymore. Do you know what he was doing during the game? Looking through a chess magazine during the game with me - a grandmaster! He doesn’t respect a grandmaster!’ Korchnoi stomped out.
“So I reprimanded Teymur: ‘I told you a thousand times to be careful with Korchnoi. He’s very emotional.’
“Teymur replied: ‘I was reading the magazine when the score was 3-0, but he didn’t say anything. So why did he get upset when the score became 3-1?’
The boy was right. Korchnoi simply got angry once he realized he was losing the game.
*Unquote*
@ arne
Disrespectful behaviour has nothing to do with being eccentric. Chucky is eccentric and still polite; Korchnoi disrespects and insults his fellow human beings.
So following you “living legends” have the right to be disrespectful? I strongly disagree. I do not care if it’s a living legend, a Hollywood star or a patzer being disrespectful, it is wrong from a human point of view.
I am not saying that Korchnoi is a bad human being in general, of course not, but what I am saying is that the question whether somebody is a legend, a nobel prize winner or whatever should never allow him to misbehave. It’s simply not acceptable.
“All animals are equal but some are more equal than the others”, huh?
And the question whether his critics misbehave in the same way doesn’t change anything about his behaviour being wrong. It has nothing to do with each other whatsoever.
i like Kortchnoi
I don’t like Korchnoi.
This discussion isn’t about chess anymore…
Let’s give the man the credits and respect he deserves for being a great chess player. Being a bad loser is his problem.
Anyway, kudos to Agdestein! I’m greatly impressed!
Just watched the videos. Korchnoi is a wise old man, but when he gets excited he loses his wisdom.
Please make more interviews with him, when he is calm and relaxed, those are real gems.
Kortchnoi is the best
he was rude with staff when he face karpov in Baguio city in the seventies
Concerning the cases with Estrada and Stellwagen… well, I find it entirely appropriate to humiliate one’s opponent for not knowing when to resign, but of course, only if you have actually managed to win the game in the end.
By the way, is there a secret depository of information about Caruana’s arrogance? I have never stumbled onto it and do not see a slightest reason to think anything negative of him.
Viktor ‘the Terrible’ Korchnoi just added to his 60 year history of being a poor sport and sore loser. His very rude comment, after losing on time, to the prodigy GM Fabiano Caruana (’You never will play chess’) shows how despicable a person he is. Viktor, you are a piece of crap. Take a hike up the Matterhorn and lose your balance!
@Clafa Your overreaction is even worse than Kortchnoi’s, so what makes you that?
@ jussu
Just a personal impression based on the way he acts in interviews, but it’s true he never said anything arrogant to my knowledge. So just a personal impression I stated in a side-sentence (and another user reacted to it).
So please never mind. It wasn’t a claim at all, leave alone a topic to discuss about, just my personal feeling of sympathy.
@ clafa
Korchnoi is disrespectful and insulting to others (although I can’t remember him calling somebody he doesn’t know personally “piece of crap”).
You are disrespectful and insulting to Korchnoi.
Congratulations, you put yourself on the same level than him.