Thursday, April 10, 2008

Forgettable in Russan Teams

Earlier this year Russian GM Ian Nepomniachtchi, rated 2634, topped the powerful Aeroflot Open with a score of 7 points. He was undefeated throughout that whole tournament. The latest issue of the RP-based newsletter, The Chess Plaza Weekender, was even moved to proclaim, "Remember this name: Ian Nepomniachtchi".

But now playing for team "64" in the ongoing Russian Team Championships, GM Nepomniachtchi has so far failed to win a single game. In the five rounds that he's played in, Nepomniachtchi has lost four and drawn just 1. This one below was a shocker and I'm sure it's something that Nepomniachtchi would rather forget.

2008 Russian Team Championships
Mamedyarov, S.
Nepomniachtchi, I.
D47

1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Nf3 e6 5. e3 Nbd7 6. Bd3 dxc4 7. Bxc4 b5 8. Bd3 Bb7 9. e4 b4 10. Na4 c5 11. e5 Nd5 12. O-O cxd4 13. Nxd4 g6 14. f4 a6 15. f5 Qh4 16. fxe6 Qxd4+ 17. Kh1 O-O-O 18. exd7+ Kb8 19. Bxa6 Qxe5 20. Re1 Qd6 21. Re8 Qxd7 22. Bf4+ Bd6 23. Rxh8 1-0

Meanwhile, over in Dubai - GM Wesley So is on course towards his ambition of Super GM status. Overnight he prevailed over current world junior champ GM Ahmed Adly of Egypt to move up to 4/4. According to our friends in ChessDom, Wesley's performance is a whopping 3104! On the other hand, we're terribly upset that ChessDom refers to Wesley as a mere "IM". We are expecting a speedy correction.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

And it happens for the 2nd time! Apologies for this, corrected now.
Wesley also won in the 5th round.