2009 Linares SuperGM (Linares, Spain)

Anand and Aronian played a theoretical battle featuring a positional pawn sacrifice. Anand appeared to be OK and was close to solving his problems when he blundered and ending up losing his pawn center. Aronian is very tricky and is very tenacious. He swindled Vassily Ivanchuk famously last year in Linares.

Dominguez and Carlsen were the first to finish and entered a wild opening line that amounted to a short three-fold repetition (to the disapproval of fans). Grischuk beat Wang Yue in a repeat of a game from their Grand Prix encounter. Wang Yue was coming off of a 82-game unbeaten streak. He has lost a few since and he was outplayed in this opposite-colored bishop ending. The Radjabov-Ivanchuk was the only game that didn’t test the limits… draw.

With wins today, Aronian and Grischuk hold any early lead.

Linares banners. Photo by Nadja Woisin.

There were three decisive games in round four. Viswanathan Anand toppled Wang Yue after the Chinese GM failed to hold a tough ending. After compiling an 82-game unbeaten streak, Wang has lost a half dozen games in the past few months. Perhaps he will have to make some minor adjustments in his preparation. In an instructive game, white traded a wrecked pawn structure for space and queenside pressure.

Teimour Radjabov continues to slide with another loss against Grischuk. He decided to play the popular pawn sacrifice a move early against the Queen’s Indian and castled queenside! Grischuk took the pawn and was able to solidify into a very solid position that he converted. Aronian took 92 moves to get the point from the Cuban champion. Carlsen and Ivanchuk played a relatively quiet draw.

Main Street in Linares. Photo by Nadja Woisin

Standings

1. Grischuk, Aronian 3; 2nd-3rd. Anand, 2½; 4th-6th. Carlsen, Ivanchuk, 2; Dominguez, 1½; 7th-8th. Wang, Radjabov, 1.

All you Dragon lovers might want to study Leinier vs Teimour game. Round 5, Linares.

Glenn,

Interesting Dragon battle! First 15 or so moves are theory. I remember studying these lines for hours as a junior. The exchange sack is standard and I liked the play Radjabov got with black. Dominguez was fortunate to survive this. Did you see Anand’s save! Really difficult endgame and he came up with that stalemating trick.

yes, I saw Anand great escape; Although, against Carlsen he was unable to escape and went down in flames. Anand is having a difficult tournament. It happens to everyone. Concerning the Dragon: I was a Dragon lover in my scholastic years. Its a strong opening and White can be punish early on if he enters into the main lines and don’t know theory. Even today, with the hole on d5 (there are many variations where White’s knight jump to this square) White is unable to find a way punish Black for this hole in his position. Dominguez was indeed lucky to survive. The Dragon lives on.

This story sound very true. I always like Ivanchuk attitude toward chess and competition in general. I have seen a number of interviews of him and he seems like a very likable person. Not to mention super strong. Ivanchuk for world champion.

Interesting article on the 9.O-O-O Dragon line with 9…d5!? I suppose the Yugoslav Attack is out of vogue. I used to play both 9.O-O-O, 9.Bc4 and 9.g4 lines. The problem with the first is the 9…d5!? line which gives black adequate play. The Yugoslav was so well-analyzed that I couldn’t keep up with the nuances, but the …h5 idea was most popular. When I was studying Karpov intensely, I saw him play 9.g4 before castling and won a nice game against Korchnoi. Black seems to have adequate resources and I believe players such and Radjabov and Carlsen have resurrected the debate.

ChessBase: https://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=5248

Chessbase did a brief history of Linares and mentioned the great general Hannibal: “The city of Linares, where the Super-GM tournament is being held, is located in the Andalusian province of Jaén, Spain, and has a long history, dating back into antiquity. It was at Linares that Carthaginian general Hannibal married the local Iberian princess Himilce on the eve of the Second Punic War.”

Some exciting chess this round highlighted by Wang Yue win over Magnus Carlsen. Wang played very actively and seem to win the initiative in the opening. Black’s pieces took up menacing positions and Wang uncorked the devastating 24…Rxb6! to begin an attack on the king. The white king was flushed out in the open and the white rooks appeared helpless to prevent the onslaught. Carlsen had to donate his queen, the the fleet-footed black queen gobbled up pawns in the process.

Wang’s steamrolling pawns on the kingside were too much and Carlsen had to resign. Not sure why chess media continue to use phrases like “wins with black” or shockingly “lost with white”. Perhaps one day black will simply catch up in the analysis as white had a decades where little analysis was done from the black side. Black is now finding tremendous resources and play will continue to level out over time.

Radjabov played the cute 21.Bxh6! to net a pawn and grind out a nice R+P ending. The two other games were drawn, but were perhaps more exciting than the wins. Anand-Dominguez was one of the games where a spectator would have problems figuring out what is going on. The game was full of tactic blows and counterblows, but petered out into a drawn R+P ending. Grischuk-Ivanchuk was a wild affairs with material imbalance, heavy pieces on the board, open king and lots of tricks. The game ended in three-fold repetition.

Standings

1st. Grischuk, 6½; 2nd. Ivanchuk, 5½; 3rd-5th. Carlsen, Anand, Aronian, 5; 6th-7th. Wang, Radjabov, 4½; 8th. Dominguez, 4.

Someone has to make way for Vlady,Topa,Shirov and Leko definitely next year .

Standings
1st. Grischuk, 7; 2nd-3rd. Ivanchuk, Carlsen 6½; 4th-5th. Anand, Aronian, 6; 6th-7th. Wang, Radjabov, 5½; 8th. Dominguez, 5.

Final Standings
1st-2nd. Grischuk, Ivanchuk, 8; 3rd. Carlsen, 7½; 4th. Anand, 7; 5th-7th. Aronian, Wang, Radjabov, 6½; 8th. Dominguez, 6.