Wang Yue scores 6th, Korchnoi wins again

“They don’t believe that I can play chess,” Korchnoi said after he had scored his second win in a row. Until now it takes 77 years of Experience to beat a Rising Star.

“This is the second time that a Dutch player continues with a rook down against me,” was another classic spoken by Korchnoi after he won his game against Daniel Stellwagen, who had left the playing hall already. In an Open Ruy Lopez, one of Korchnoi’s life-long pet lines, the Dutchman had lost a pawn but in the following ending he almost drew the game.

Besides his loss, perhaps his opponent’s loud coughing during the final phase, or the fact that Korchnoi didn’t write down the moves for a while, might have distracted Stellwagen at some point. But it must be said that the Swiss legend won the game convincingly, with a nice strong last move 74…Be6! erasing all of Stellwagen’s illusions that were left.

The other news of the day is more of the same story: Wang Yue won. Remarkably, he doesn’t just keep on winning, but it seems to be easier every round for the Chinese GM. He defeated Ljubojevic without much effort, after the grandmaster from Linares got into heavy timetrouble. Because he played a bit too quickly himself, the Chinese player probably missed a quicker win, but it didn’t really matter. Ljubo lost on time, and Wang Yue’s ticket to Amber in March 2009 seems almost certain now.

Of the three draws, only Cheparinov-Agdestein was interesting. Another strong performance by the Norwegian member of the Experience team, and he might have missed a win, which wasn’t the first time here in Amsterdam by the way.

The score is now 21½-8½ for the Rising Stars team:

Here are the games of the sixthround:

Links:

• Official website
• Games in PGN