Ivanchuk and Vachier-Lagrave win in spectacular 8th round in Biel
28 July 2009, 22.31 CET | Last modified: 17:31 | By Peter Doggers | Filed under: Reports | Tags:
Alekseev and Gelfand sharpened the Biel record and drew in just 11 moves, but the other two games still made the 8th round in Biel the most spectacular thus far. Vachier-Lagrave defeated Morozevich with Black in an absolutely amazing game, but Ivanchuk also maintained his shared first place in the standings by beating Caruana.
The Biel Chess Festival takes place July 18 to 31 in Biel, Switzerland. The Grandmaster Tournament is a six-player round-robin with Gelfand (2755), Morozevich (2751), Alekseev (2714), Vachier-Lagrave (2703), Ivanchuk (2703) and Caruana (2670).
Round 8
All the attention in this eighth round went to the absolutely amazing game between Alexander Morozevich and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, which was eventually won by the young Frenchman, after he had survived a “-10 position”. Morozevich had come up with a dangerous new idea in a hyper-sharp Najdorf (English Attack) and after locking the black king and rook on g8 and h8 with a pawn on g6, the mate was there, but not easy to find.
White could have won instantly with 26.Rxf8+! as all computers will immediately point out, but it’s a difficult move and therefore calling 26.Rxa8? a blunder would be too much. It’s very easy to make such a typical computer-check comment these days. Thirty years ago we would have never called it a blunder, but probably something along the lines of “a mistake in a highly complex situation”. I’m of the opinion that the engine’s evaluation switching from green to red, and from +10 to -2 or whatever, is the only reason why we (I’ve probably done the same every now and then) started calling such moves blunders. We shouldn’t.
Vachier-Lagrave’s 27…Rh7!? was the next, highly creative moment in this game, with which Black tried to activate, well, at least his knight. But White just left that rook en prise as this way it stayed out of the game, and the knight on f8 as well.
Just when White seemed to deliver a new blow on move 33, Vachier-Lagrave countered strongly and proved that it was a mistake. Another error on move 40 resulted in a lost position for Morozevich, but then the Russian on his turn had another last trick up his sleeve: just continue that strategy of leaving Rh7 and Nf8 where they are, because the rest of the board is just queens and opposite-coloured bishops!
However, White couldn’t prevent the exchange of queens and then, like the finish of a good prison movie, Vachier-Lagrave found the only way to free his rook in the end. For this incredibly difficult game we’ve based our notes largely on Mikhail Golubev’s in Chess Today and in return we’re happy to mention once more that this daily PDF (+PGN) email newspaper is highly recommended!
Caruana-Ivanchuk was not bad either. The ever-unpredictable Ukrainian went for the Pirc Defence this time and proved that his king was perfectly safe on d8. A difficult middlegame arose where Black’s 24…g5 looked stronger than it was since 26.fxg5 Nf4+ 27.Kh1 Nxh3 28.Nge4 looks better for White. It looks like Caruana was tricked by his opponent just after that, and the Italian’s liquidation to an ending was only postponing the inevitable.
Only with such interesting games in the same round it’s possible to be indifferent about an 11-move draw between Alekseev and Gelfand. But it does leave a bad taste; the draw is part of chess, but the non-game isn’t.
Games round 8
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Biel Chess Festival 2009 | Schedule & results
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Hmm, hard choice, 27… Rh7 or 24… g5, what move is more beautiful…
Can’t say about the quality of the game, but Moro-Vachier it’s an instant classic. 27…Rh7 OMG!!
Congratulationsboth player for such an epic fight!
The game between Moro and Maximus VL was brilliant indeed , congratulations to both players
26.Rxa8 is a big, I mean, BIG, blunder by Morozevich. The game is really entertaining, anyway.
Yes, incredible! 26.Rxf8+ looks like an easy win, though difficult for us mortals to find over the board, but Morozevich was the right person in the right place…! It’s exactly his kind of move and idea. Ok, he isn’t perfect either
Double zero to Alekseev and Gelfand afer 11 move draw in Petroff. It is ridicilous for such type of tournaments…
Wow, what an absolutely amazing game by Vachier-Lagrave and Morozevich! Must be the most entertaining game of the decade.
http://www.xs4all.nl/~timkr/records/records.htm doesn’t give the longest en prise of a rook, but probably this game broke the record!
Great game. How does someone find a move as Rh7?
See item 248:
http://www.xs4all.nl/~timkr/chess2/diary_13.htm
In Morozevich – Vachier-Lagrave the Black rook has been en prise for 23 consecutive moves. A complication is that during this sequence, White could on 7 moves not actually capture the rook because he had to lift checks.
This affects the formulation of this kind of record.
@Peter
your comment about me is a bit unfair: of course I could only tell the move is a “blunder” after checking with a computer, but I saw the move unaided, and could not find a refutation (nor a clear way to win, to be honest). And the game was really interesting, but had Morozevich found this winning move, it would, in my opinion, be better, it would crown his strong play up to that moment with a wonderful move.
That’s exactly my point. Thirty years ago we would have never called it a blunder, but probably something along the lines of “a mistake in a highly complex situation”. I’m still of the opinion that the engine’s evaluation switching from green to red, and from +10 to -2 or whatever, is the only reason why we (I’ve probably done the same every now and then) started calling such moves blunders. We shouldn’t.
It seems that Biel players were reading the nice article below on Beauty in chess VI by Michael Schwerteck. Moro acknowledge it by playing a spectacular game that he should have won. However, some other players seem to have also read attentively the article but are cavalierly behaving in the opposite way. Funny!!!
@ Peter
You are right, but then you should write exactly what you just wrote in your article. Just put exactly that sentences in your article: “Thirty years ago [...]. We shouldn’t.”
Just copy in the paragraph you just wrote in the comments.
Pointining out / singleing a single user like “nep” in your article is just unpolite and bad style. It’s personal. You should remove that part and, as said, just make your point without mentioning a specific user.
And please don’t take that as a personal attack- you know from my comments and mails that I am definitely not one of the negative, complaining users here and that I appreciate your work. I just think that with that personal comment about “nep” in an article (if you write it in the comments it’s different I’d say) you went a bit over the top (I know you didn’t mean it to be a personal attack, but it still feels wrong)- man, you’re too choleric at times.
Just my 5 cents of course.
Enough unimportant off-topic here, back to the meaning of life (=chess):
A-M-A-Z-I-N-G game!
As a patzer (far more patzer than most people writing here, I’m probably like 1600) I had no clue what was happening, but hey, even though I didn’t understand what the fireworks where about my mouth surely dropped open at their colors and sparkles!
Oh, and I think the Computer said Caruana was a bit stronger for some time, but hey…not that it matters. Go Chuky! Soon he’ll be TOP 10 again.
Agreed, and edited.
@ Peter
P.S.:
It’s a bit along the same line when people suddenly try to de-valorise a game by Morphy or Anderssen because the Computer finds a refutation; I think in the “Immortal” game there is a refutation somewhere through which Kieseritzky could have reached a draw (although after all this material given away by Anderssen a draw as “best possible result for the opponent” is still crazy).
Or there is a beautiful game by Bird (I think) where I remember people (of course on chessgames, where else do you go if your ego is too big or small…) going like: “There’s a refutation! It means the combination was wrong and the game is worth nothing! Hahaha! This game and therefore Bird are overrated!”
Are they kidding me??
queen sac somebody found over the board there is a mistake in move 18- who cares? Some people seem to look at games only to push their own egos by finding a so-called “mistake” in the beauty and feeling satisfied.
If in a 20-move-combination with a triple
It’s like pointing out a technical or anatomical mistake in a painting by da Vinci an claiming that therefore it’s worthless. Pointing out the mistake is ok (and also feeling good about finding it over the board by yourself), but it doesn’t take away anything from the beauty.
(nep: Of course I don’t mean you in what I write here, I am just following Peter’s general train of thoughts)
@ Peter
Thanks. Besides that paragraph definitely makes the article better since it’s a good point.
I think 27. …Rh7 is being overpraised. It’s a good move, but it was obvious (yes, before actualy played!) for me, unlike (not played by Morozevich) 26.Rxf8+ or (played by V.-Lagrave) 35. …a4, for instance.
)
The rook was dead for the moment. V.-Lagrave had already sort of “sacrificed” it! He just should ensure it’s corps wouldn’t prevent the king to have a luft in h8, as many variations with checks require. And taking that dead body on h7 was bad for white, that was always clear.
Of course, in the end it was a Phoenix, ensuring black’s win, but the priority for black was to survive first (sorry for the pleonasm “priority-first”
In my opinion, blunders are obvious mistakes. Rxa8 was not an obvious error at all, so it’s not a blunder by my book. But I reckon others may think differently about it.
Btw I don’t see what’s wrong with mentioning commenters in a post. After all, don’t the commenters often also mention the author in their posts?
As for the 26.Rxa8?? “blunder”, I parcialy agree with both “nep” and Peter!
We should be humble before such genious and games!
But with that respect preserved, AND because we’re talking about Morozevich (who, BTW have just won against another genious Ivanchuk), I cannot but agree with “nep”: 26.Rxa8 is simply a huge blunder. (Note that one can say this without meaning any mispraising about Morozevich, or any autopraising on ourselves — pleonasms run on me today).
Arne,
Michel83 was refering to the article, and said something about doing it on posts.
Anyway it is of arguable importance, if it wasn’t insulting.
Well, I didn take as personal, and thinking better, maybe it was deserved – it is a good point to make, anyway, the fact that strong chess engines are changing the way not only patzers look at games, but how GMs are using them as well, and this changed how the game is played at the top level. (Digressing, this can be compared to what samples and computers made to music, maybe!?)
Another point, to be fair, is probably the move 26.Rxf8+ is really difficult to find OTB, or Vachier-Lagrave would have played 25…Bxh3, apparently the only defense (haha, no, I didn see this move by myself). Or at least call 25…Bb7 a blunder as well, because this move allows 26.Rxf8+.
It is a (”normal”) blunder. In most of the times Morozevich wouldn’t doubt a minute about Rxf8+ being (far) better.
Ah! And being the kind of chess player he is, surely most of the times he in fact WOULD consider that move. I think an abnormality happened, and it can perfectly be called a blunder, why not?
What an oportunity Caruana has lost! For example with 50.Rf1? Maybe after that he still had a won game, but 50.Rh6!! seems to be THE move, not fearing 50.Rh5, because of 51.Ne5+, followed by 52.Nf3+, 53.Rxh5 and 54.Nxh2 1-0
*not fearing 50. …Rh5
(black move)
Sure, there is 51….Rxe5, but that is a lost rook ending, after 52.Rxh2 Kf4 53.Rd2!!
Sorry, I must mention that these comments on Caruana’s oportunity refers to today’s game (July 29th, Round 9, game Caruana x Alexeev)
The game Morozevich-Vachier Lagrave reminded me of Portisch-Tal, 1964. I didn’t know the year anymore, so I looked it up, but I did remember Tal, a rook behind and another rook and piece hanging, playing the quiet move h7-h5.
Don’t let anyone dare to feed this piece of art to Rybka, just to start discussions about what constitutes a blunder.
Perfection may get boring, but games like these will be remembered forever.
@Castro: You missed a detail in Caruana-Alekseev: 50.Rh6?? Rh5 51. Ne5+ Kg5! 52. Nf3+ Kh6: (or 52.Nf7+ Kh4).
So at least your suggestion wasn’t engine analysis ,:) .
There are rare ocasions when I do see more than a master, but this was not one hehehe.
Anyway, Caruana must have had more than one shot at a clear win, right? Maybe even in the N+3P vs. R+1P… Maybe I’ll try later. Or simply wait for reading better ones analisys, because I don’t have much time.
Must again express disagreement with those critics on fast draws.
I’m maybe one of a few, but I strongly disagree with those critics, when they lead or induce the wrongly called anti-draw measures (Bilbao and/or Sofia. Ah! And next shameful London), because they are simply anti-chess ones.
Insist on invitations/prizes-like stimulous, leave alone the exact role and weight of draw in chess, and the exact liberty of the players!
I see that many people gets (more/much more) satisfied if, instead of those 11 moves, one is presented with 40 other, ending on a triple repetition, for example. 40 other more or less plausible moves, and maybe as unfought as the mentioned 11 (only the 2 GMs playing know, you see?!)
Or else, go call that stupid new game a different name. Please!
One more proof is that those “GM draws” have always existed, and THAT didn’t kill chess. We’re still here, treated with lots of beautiful games everyday.
One thing is disliking if some 2 GMs fast-draw some game. If invitations, prizes, etc. are to be credited and strongly applied, they will be 2 of the last masoquists in top-class chess.
Other thing is messing with the game in useless and barbarian ways like Bilbao and Sofia.