If I’m tasked with drawing up a wish list of the top three chess events to follow through the Internet this year, I wouldn’t have any problem in identifying the world chess championship match this April between Viswanathan Anand and Veselin Topalov and the end-of-year Chess Olympiad in Khanty-Mansiysk as among them.
The third? This has got to be a no-brainer choice for me. It can only be the annual tournament at Wijk aan Zee in the Netherlands. Chess people know it better as the Corus chess tournament.
The Corus chess tournament actually goes back a very long time but in those old days, the event wasn’t known as Corus. That came much later in year 2000. When the event began in 1938, it was known simply as the Hoogovens tournament, named after the Dutch steel and aluminium producer, Koninklijke Hoogovens. In 1999, this company merged with British Steel and the new entity became the Corus Group.
So this tournament is well steeped in history. Earlier this week, the latest in the long line of Corus chess tournaments ended in Wijk aan Zee. Its main attraction was the 14-man Group A event that featured some of the world’s top players including Viswanathan Anand (the current world chess champion), Vladimir Kramnik (a previous classical chess world champion) and Magnus Carlsen (currently the highest ranked player in the world).
Then, as if this trio just wasn’t enough, the other participants included some of the most well-known veterans in international chess: Alexei Shirov, Vassily Ivanchuk, Peter Leko and the evergreen Nigel Short.
Now, many of you reading this column will know that occasionally I’d enthuse about how chess today is dominated by players who are getting younger in their years. This is, of course, a worldwide phenomenon and in fact, not even restricted to chess alone. We find that youths are dominating all areas of sport.
Much so at the Corus chess tournament too. Apart from the 19-year-old Carlsen, the other “babies” of the Group A tournament were Sergey Karjakin (20 years old), Hikaru Nakamura (22 years old) and Fabiano Caruana (17 years old).
But of course, how can I term this young man a baby when he is presently the highest ranked player in the world and was a co-winner at Corus two years ago? I can hardly term him as a baby, can I?
And in all seriousness, Karjakin is no baby chess player either, because he has impeccable chess credentials too. He started off in Corus this year as the defending champion but his crown was snatched away by one of the other “baby” players, Carlsen.
So there we have it, in the last three years the most significant feature of the Corus chess tournaments was the domination of teenaged chess grandmasters. Carlsen was only 17 years old when he became a joint winner in 2008. Karjakin was 19 years old when he won the event in 2009. And now in 2010, Carlsen has won the tournament out-right at 19 years of age.
By the way, Carlsen wasn’t the only teenager making a great splash at this year’s Corus event. In the Group B tournament, another teenager was creating a lot of interest: 15-year-old Anish Giri of the Netherlands. Giri, whose father is Nepalese, was born and raised in Russia. In February 2009, he qualified as a chess grandmaster and at that time, he was also the world’s youngest.
Giri won the Group B event ahead of many of his contemporaries and rivals that included 16-year-old Wesley So of the Philippines, 16-year-old Parimarjan Negi of India and 19-year-old David Howell of England.
For good measure, I also want to mention that the Corus Group C tournament was won by 20-year-old Li Chao from China. Li will get his chance to play in the Group B tournament next year just as Giri will also get him chance in next year’s Group A tournament.
With so many youthful chess talents from around the world making names for themselves, I think chess is in for a very interesting and exciting future. I just can’t wait for more of them to take over the world.
This week, I’d like to feature an exciting game that was played in the final round of the Corus Group A tournament between Shirov and Leinier Dominguez. At the critical point in the game when the two players agreed to a draw, Shirov was actually winning. However, chess is not played on position alone. There’s also the time factor to contend with and both players were tremendously short on time at that stage of the game. After the game, Shirov discovered that had he pressed on to win the game, he would have won the tournament too, overtaking Carlsen at the top of the standings.
White: Alexei Shirov
Black: Leinier Dominguez
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bg5 Nbd7 7.Bc4 Qb6 8.Bb3 e6 9.Qd2 Be7 10.0–0–0 Nc5 11.f3 Qc7 12.Kb1 0–0 13.g4 b5 14.a3 Rb8 15.h4 Bd7 16.Bxf6 Bxf6 17.g5 Bd8 18.h5 a5 19.g6 Nxb3 20.Nxb3 fxg6 21.hxg6 h6 22.Nxa5 (The start of all the complications. White could have chosen the straight-forward 22.Qxd6 and won a pawn) 22….Rxf3 23.e5 Be8 24.exd6 Qxa5 25.Rxh6 gxh6 26.Qxh6 Bf6 27.d7 Bxc3 28.dxe8Q+ Rxe8 (White needs to be very careful because a careless 29.Rd7 loses to 29….Rf1+ 30.Ka2 Ra1+ and he will be checkmated) 29.Qh1 (This could easily have been the Move Of The Game, a quiet sort of move that protects the back rank and now really threatening 30.Rd7 next) 29….Re7 30.Qxf3 Bg7 ½-½ (White should be winning after 31.b4 Qc7 22.Qa8+ Bf8 33.Rf1 etc)
Up next
Seri Putra chess
The Perak International Chess Association will organize the Seri Putra chess tournament (open, under-15, under-12 and under-10 events) at the Sekolah Menengah Seri Putra hall on Sunday.
Entry fees are RM5 for the under-12 and under-10 events and RM10 for the under-15 and open events. The closing date for entries is Feb 4. To register, contact Abu Bakar Abdullah (014.2510852 or 014.2510952) or visit http://perakchess.blogspot.com
KL rapid grand prix
The Kuala Lumpur Chess Association (KLCA) and Polgar Chess Asia will jointly organize a KL rapid grand prix beginning next month. The grand prix, sponsored by the Malaysian Intellectual Development Foundation and the Royal Selangor Club (RSC), will feature four legs from February to May and followed by the grand final in June. The first leg will be held this weekend.
Each leg will have six rounds with a 45-minute rate of play per player for each round. The top 10 winners of the open and under-12 sections will be given free entry to their respective sections in the final. Total prize fund for the grand prix is RM6,600.
Entry fees for the open section are RM15 for members of the KLCA and the RSC and RM20 for non-members. For the under-12 section, the entry fees are RM5 for children of KLCA and RSC members and RM10 for others. All legs will be played at the RSC’s Card Room at Dataran Merdeka, Kuala Lumpur. More details at the KLCA website, (http://www.klchess.com/)
Malaysia-Singapore match
Get set for the resumption of the Malaysia versus Singapore chess duel 2010 on Feb 16-17. This double round chess match over 40 boards will take place at the Cititel Express in Kuala Lumpur. On Feb 16, the players shall fight over two games played with long time controls while on the following day, there’ll be two games with rapid time controls. If all our top players can set some time off from their Chinese New Year celebrations, this will be a very keenly contested match. And if all you can spare some time off from your own celebration, come and watch and support your team in action.
Pearl Point age group
The Excel Chess Academy will organize the Pearl Point age group chess tournament for under-11 and under-9 players at the Pearl Point shopping mall , Old Klang Road, Kuala Lumpur on Feb 21.
Entry fees are RM18 per player but it will cost only RM15 to register through a school. Closing date is Feb 19. More details from Jax Tham (jaxtham@hotmail.com)
UTP open
The Universiti Teknologi Petronas will organize their UTP chess open tournament at their campus in Bandar Seri Iskandar, Tronoh, Perak on Feb 21. There will be an open section as well as an under-18 and under-12 sections.
Entry fees are RM20 for the open, RM15 for under-18 and RM10 for under-12. UTP students and staff need pay only RM15 upon presentation of their matrix cards. Closing date is Feb 7. More details, contact Hussein (017.6410194, husseinnordin@gmail.com), Faizal (017.3934291, faizalakram91@gmail.com) or Qistina (019.2602094).
Malaysian women’s masters
After the success of last year’s Malaysian Masters tournament at the DATCC, next comes the Malaysian Women’s Masters tournament starting Feb 26. There will be 16 players who will play knock-out matches. More information is available from MCF secretary Gregory Lau (012.9020123, greglau64@gmail.com or malaysianchessfederation@gmail.com) or Najib Abdul Wahab (016.3382542, najib.wahab@hotmail.com).
3rd DATCC chess league
The third DATCC Kuala Lumpur commercial and recreational chess league at the Datuk Arthur Tan Chess Centre, Wilayah Complex will kick off on Mar 24. The DATCC chess league is a Fide-rated team tournament played over nine rounds with long time controls. Each round will be played on Wednesdays at the chess centre.
Entry fee is RM400 per team of a maximum 10 players. Junior teams (players below 20 years old) are charged at RM200. Any entry received after Mar 12 will need to pay an extra RM100. Details are available from Hamid Majid (019.3158098, aham@pc.jaring.my) or Najib Abdul Wahab (016.3382542, najib.wahab@hotmail.com).
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