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Anand – Kramnik 1/2-1/2 (1.42.52)
Karjakin – Topalov 1/2-1/2 (4.10.12)
Mamedyarov – Andreikin 1-0 (4.15.06)
Aronian – Svidler 1-0 (5.21.33)
I only have two small points to add to today’s games. The first is in Mamedyarov – Andrekin, which was essentially decided by time trouble. Obviously it is stupid to be down to seconds at move 37, but still this happens to all of us at times.
The main point is that the position after 37.Rd8+ is a classical example of elimination, the main defensive calculation technique:
[fen size=”small”]2qR2k1/2P3b1/1p2b2p/5p2/4rQ2/6P1/2N2P1P/6K1 b – – 0 37[/fen]
Andreikin chose wrong. He should have played 37…Kh7 with more or less even chances, while after 37…Kf7 38.Qd6 Qa6, White does not only win back his piece, but won the entire game after 39.Rd7+!. Had the king been on h7, this would not have been possible. Andreikin had seen this, but said he had missed that 39…Kg8 loses to 40.c8=Q (as well as everything else). It is all a bit bizarre to me, but in time trouble people can often get confused.
In Aronian’s game Svidler could early on have gone for a slightly worse opposite coloured bishops ending, as he mentions in the video. This would not have been as simple as some would think.
But more importantly, I think he made a big mistake at this point:
[fen size=”small”]2r1k3/pb2qn1p/1p4p1/1Q1PP3/8/8/2r2PPP/B2RR1K1 b – – 0 34[/fen]
Rather than suffering in an unclear position with 34…Kf8, which is without doubt easier to play for White, Svidler played 34…Qd7 to go into an opposite coloured bishops ending. He is only somewhat worse, objectively. But I have noticed that when we have positions with opposite coloured bishops, the stronger player scores much better than he otherwise would. If you look at Kramnik’s games in London 2013 and also his game with Karjakin here, his only game with White so far, he aims for positions early on in the game for positions with opposite coloured bishops. Carlsen also has a fantastic score in endgames with opposite coloured bishops.
Obviously, with this in mind, it is quite interesting that Svidler and Aronian both praised 34…Qd7. In my experience things that hang on very long calculation in defence are very unreliable. This is what Svidler was counting on. Do not miss the press conference; the player’s comments are very interesting.
So, although it looked dangerous to play on with an extra piece with queens on the board, probably this was statistically the better choice. If nothing else, it also gave some chance that he would win the game as well.
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