1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Qxd4 Nc6 5.Qd2
In the second half of the FIDE Candidates Tournament in Yekaterinburg, Alexander Grischuk chose an unorthodox setup against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave’s Sicilian Najdorf, which the world champion had successfully tested three years ago. Grischuk played the over-the-board novelty 9.Ne2 – previously 9.g3 was played. But is it an improvement? Mihail Marin sees good reasons for this, but also shows that Vachier-Lagrave was unable to exploit the potential of Black s position. His conclusion is nevertheless: As a player who doesn‘t play 1.e4 so much nowadays this game has something that inspires me!
120th
Fabiano Caruana, Ding Liren, Levon Aronian, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Wesley So and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave are all out, which may partly be explained by a clash with the Chess 9LX Champions Showdown in Saint Louis (planned for September 7-10 - check out our full 2021 Chess Calendar).
There are some impressive replacements, however, including World Championship Challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi, so that it’s very likely the Clarion Hotel in Stavanger will witness Magnus and Ian clash for the final time in a classical game before their World Championship match starts in Dubai on November 24th.
Sergey Karjakin beat Fabiano Caruana in Norway Chess 2014 to finish half a point ahead of Magnus and win his 2nd event in a row | photo: Even Emberland, official website
€29.90
An exciting final day of action
The 2021 Polish Championships were played in two different formats. The open section was a 16-player knockout event while the women’s section was a 10-player single round robin. Except for Jan-Krzysztof Duda, every player from the national top 10 participated.
The Ruy Lopez is one of the oldest openings which continues to enjoy high popularity from club level to the absolute world top. In this video series, American super GM Fabiano Caruana, talking to IM Oliver Reeh, presents a complete repertoire for White.
In the end, it was rating favourite Radoslaw Wojtaszek who won the open tournament, defeating Wojciech Moranda in the final match. This was Wojtaszek’s fourth victory in the national championship. The experienced grandmaster had won the event for the first time in 2005, the same year he was awarded the GM title, at 18. Poland’s number 2 also prevailed in 2014 and 2016.
€189.90
A knockout and a round robin
Bydgoszcz is a city in norther Poland, a part of the Bydgoszcz–Toruń metropolitan area, which totals over 850,000 inhabitants. The eighth-largest city in Poland, it is located between the Vistula and Oder rivers, which means the city belongs to a water system connected via the Noteć, Warta and Elbe with the Rhine and Rotterdam.
Known as
Little Berlin, Bydgoszcz is an architecturally rich city, with neo-gothic, neo-baroque, neoclassicist, modernist and Art Nouveau styles present. The notable granaries on Mill Island and along the riverside belong to one of the most recognized timber-framed landmarks in Poland.
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GM Magnus Carlsen takes the top seed after 15 games in the preliminary rounds. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.
New In Chess Classic: Carlsen, Nakamura Top Seeds
How to watch?
The games of the New in Chess Classic preliminaries can be found here as part of our live events platform. IM Levy Rozman and IM Anna Rudolf are providing daily commentary on GM Hikaru Nakamura s Twitch channel starting at 10:00 a.m. Pacific / 19:00 Central Europe.
GMs Wesley So, Levon Aronian, Alireza Firouzja, Le Quang Liem, and Teimour Radjabov finished in 4th-8th place, respectively, and advance to the quarterfinals. GM Leinier Dominguez Perez almost made it to the top eight, ending the day only half a point behind Radjabov.