Carlsen and Gelfand win in round 7 Bazna
21 June 2010, 22.40 CET | Last modified: 9:39 | By Peter Doggers | Filed under: Reports | Tags:
In the seventh round of the Kings Tournament, which has returned to Bazna, Carlsen won against Radjabov. Gelfand is still a point behind the Norwegian after beating Nisipeanu with Black. Games commented by GM Dorian Rogozenco & videos.
The fourth Kings Tournament takes place in Medias, Romania from June 14 till 25. Against it’s a 6-player, double round-robin, with two rest days. This year Carlsen, Gelfand, Nisipeanu, Ponomariov, Radjabov and Wang Yue play. The rate of play is 2 hours for the first 40 moves, one hour for the next 20 moves and then 15 minutes plus an increment of 30 seconds per move.
The rounds start each day at 15.30 which is 14.30 CET and 08.30 EDT. They can run well into the evening, as we won’t see ultra-short draws in this tournament – no draw agreement by the players are allowed before move 30, except for cases of a triple-repetition, a perpetual or a theoretically drawn position.
The event is organized by Romgaz and the Chess Club Society “Elisabeta Polihroniade”. This year the tournament is officially part of the Grand Slam, substituting the cancelled MTel Masters. Venue is the brand new Romgaz Center in Medias (near Bazna), but the organizers are considering to move back to Hotel Complex Balnear Expro in Bazna, where everyone is staying.
ChessVibes will be at the tournament from start to finish, providing videos for the official website:
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Round 7
Monday morning the tournament organizers decided to move back to Bazna, where the first three editions of tournament were held as well. It was clear that the players weren’t really fond of the half an hour drive to Medias and back each day, but the final ‘drop’… were the drops of rain that fell on Carlsen and Ponomariov’s board in round 6.
To avoid any further problems as result of the unpredictable weather, all boards, pieces and other things were moved to the conference room of the hotel complex. The players and seconds were all quite happy about this. One of the reasons might have been that they now have some more football to watch each day!
After a somewhat slow start (certainly from hindsight) it’s now full steam ahead for Magnus Carlsen, who won his fourth game in a row. His tournament performance rating is now 2960 according to TWIC, 2955 according to Chessbase. (Who is right? Well, it doesn’t matter too much.) His live rating is now 2825.
“I thought it was a very good game actually,” said a cheerful Carlsen afterwards. The Norwegian pointed out that both he and his opponent Teimour Radjabov had probably played the strongest moves up till the rook ending. “He handled the position very well. I thought I should at least make him work a little bit for the half point,” said Carlsen, and after the inaccurate 32…Rc5 Black indeed needed to work hard. Radjabov had gotten into timetrouble and after 39…Kg8 the rook ending was lost. We are using Carlsen’s own words when we say that the rest was a ‘matter of technique’.
Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu was clearly disappointed after his loss against Boris Gelfand, which brought the local hero on minus two. The Romanian was mostly disturbed by the simple tactics he missed in the middlegame. He had planned 21.Rxe4 dxe4 22.Qxe4 but this is refuted by 22…Qxc6.
Ruslan Ponomariov had no reason to be happy either after his draw with Wang Yue. The Ukrainian had been clearly better and a healthy pawn up, but couldn’t win the ending. It was surprising that he didn’t play the positional standard move 28.h4, and later he simply overlooked 37…Ng6 completely.
Round 7 games commented by GM Dorian Rogozenco
Game viewer by ChessTempo
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In round 5 Carlsen won with the Dragon. Today he beats the Dragon. Very impressive.
4th consecutive win and 2825!
Somebody should have told Radjabov that playing that much aggressively (and risky), using black pieces vs Carlsen, wasn’t a good idea.
How ever, very good for us the spectators
If Gelfand can pull off a win with white against Carlsen on Tuesday (which I think he can), he has some real chances of winning the tournament. He gets the best of my wishes and may we see some great chess!
All aboard the pain train! I’m thinking Gelfand can hold Carlsen with White tomorrow thought…
yea but Gelfand needs to win to have any chance of winning the tournament. I”m predicting 0-1 cause I bet Gelfand overpresses a draw.
Thank you ChessVibes for these interviews.
It always impresses me how objectively the top players discuss their games – without too much passion and prejudice – role models for us mere mortals.
Nice to see how Carlsen builts his position in the endgame.
Like defending his c – pawn:
First from a4, then activating his rook to a slighter better way of defending from h4, and then defending it from c8!
Only c1 is missing!
Then also his choices when rooks were on seventh row. He just choses to position his rooks on best places and in the meanwhile position the black king to worst position possible.
Radjabov missed Kg6 instead of Rc5 preventing king cutted on last rank. That’s a bit weird for GM, I think.
Radjabov played great-just missed 4 easy draws in time pressure
@juanefren: If Radjabov had chosen a quieter opening, you might have written “Someone should have told him to avoid the type of position where Magnus can slowly outplay him.” !? Actually _this_ happened in the game, rather than some typical Dragon fireworks. Not for the first time I wonder whether some Carlsen fanboys actually read the report and check the analyses, let alone have an own _thorough_ look at the game …. .
I wouldn’t even say that Carlsen “beat the Dragon”, he won an endgame, not an opening battle. By comparison, Gelfand “won with the Petroff”, certain features of his (single) rook endgame were a logical result of the opening: white pawn weaknesses on the kingside, pawn storms on opposite wings with the black pawns being faster and/or more efficient.
Gelfand is the kind of professional that hardly ever overpresses, but plays healthy and what may come will come. So I predict Gelfand-Carlsen ½-½ without too much a fuss. Magnus will cruise (coast) to tournament victory.
Carlsen will not give a draw too easily, his intentions surely are to least beat and draw every oppent just like in nanjing. I bet this will be a classic again this afternoon, carlsen coming on top !
In the line with 8 …. Qb4
13. Bd4 deservers attention
@JustBe: 13.Bd4 e5! 14.Bc3: Nc3:+ regaining the queen (and keeping two extra pawns)
nice
Agree with Thomas that Carlsen won an endgame…a very thrilling one at that!
It always amazes me that so many in the roomfull of kibitzers at Carlsen’s games start out by pontificating about his losing chances….then it becomes the drawing chances….then, well Carlsen didn’t win so much as the opponent played inaccurately and Carlsen swindled them.
Carlsen’s play in this tournament is a breath of fresh air. Kings Gambit, Dragon, KID…such a joy to watch. Playing to win and eschewing draws. He is taking to the 2700 elites.
My friends, we are witnessing a one of a kind player here in GM Magnus Carlsen, one that only comes around every hundred years or so. We are very privledged indeed.
I am so looking forward to the London Chess Classic and Corus!
nice video from chessvibe but they need to do something about that retro porn music.
“My friends, we are witnessing a one of a kind player here in GM Magnus Carlsen, one that only comes around every hundred years or so. We are very privledged indeed. ”
Yeah, but some people will never appreciate anything he does, they just don’t like great chess I guess.
Vooruitgang, what’s the problem when people describe a game the way it is? Do you dislike reality? In the game against Ponomariov these losing chances were pretty relevant. And if you wonder why people underline this, take a look at yourself for the reasons. Unrealistic comments like “once in a 100 year player ” and comments about flawless play will probably trigger others to stress the truth. Frankly, I prefer that above treating him like a holy man free from critique. Or did I miss something and is Carlsen the Muhammed of chess?
Maybe Carlsen indeed is “a one of a kind player … that only comes around every hundred years or so”. But then I can name several “one of a different kind” players that are also unique: certainly Fischer, Kasparov and Tal, arguably (among currently active players) Anand, Kramnik, Topalov, Ivanchuk, … . I cannot comment on the more distant past since 1910 – Vooruitgang, what’s your age and/or in depth knowledge of chess history?
I am with S that Carlsen fanboyism shouldn’t keep people from objectively looking at the games. And there weren’t that many “Carlsen detractors”, but quite a few over-the-top comments from his fans, particularly regarding his game against Ponomariov – suggesting that Magnus had everything under control throughout the game and that the exchange sacrifice was part of a deep plan. If so, was Ponomariov’s mistake Rf2 also “planned” by Carlsen??
@S:
There is no problem discribing a game the way it is. Go back and read what I said.
I said that I am always amazed.
I have not claimed Carlsen’s play was flawless.
You are entitled to percieve reality any way you like, as am I.
@ Thomas:
Maybe so…maybe so.
I’m old enought to know better, and I’m sure my depth of knoweldge of chess history is not very deep at all. As such I will use someone else’s words that describe my thinking on the chess of Magnus Carlsen:
” By the nature of his talent Carlsen belongs to the highest catagory, which contains very few people. I don’t want to mention names, I discussed this with his father and I mentioned names and he was surprised, because some names were not there. We’re talking about the catagory of Kramnik, Anand, Ivanchuck”.
The fanboy I’ve quoted above is Gary Kasparov.