Tomsk 400, Moscow 64 and Economist 1 are leading the Russian Team Cup after 3 of 7 rounds. Top players currently playing in Dagomys include Svidler, Grischuk, Movsesian, Ivanchuk, Jakovenko and Gelfand. The first three rounds saw many draws and a bunch of interesting games, which we've selected for you for replay.

The Russian Team Cup takes place in Dagomys April 4-10, 2009. This year only 7 rounds are played in the Premier League, after the economic situation caused a couple of teams to withdraw. The Women's League is also 8 teams; the league below the Premier, interestingly called Higher League, consists of 10 teams, and started two days earlier.

The total number of 61 players in the Premier League make an average rating of 2639. There's a round every day, without a rest day. The rate of play is 100 minutes for the first 40 moves, then 50 minutes for the next 20 moves and then 10 minutes to end the game with 30 seconds increment for each move.

As always, the Russian Team Cup produces many high-level games and from the first three rounds we've made a selection of encounters we especially like. Don't miss Nepomniachtchi's combination against Kharitonov which will surely be included in future puzzle books, while Shirov clearly feels at home in the current theoretical complications of the Najdorf Poisened Pawn, against Chinese GM Wang Hao. The strongest game so far was Grischuk-Svidler; nice play by St. Petersburg's best player in a queenless, Gr?ºnfeld middlegame.

Games selection for replay

Links:

• Official site
• All details
• Europe-Echecs videos
• Games in PGN