CVO_013.pdf

No. 13, April 1, 2009

OPENINGS

WHAT’S HOT AND WHAT’S NOT?

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The latest news in the

Anti-Moscow Gambit

By IM Merijn van Delft & IM Robert Ris

Frequency

This week we have a inal look at the Amber Rapid

and Blindfold tournament where Kramnik saved up

his best novelty for the last round. We also checked

the German and Dutch Leagues.

WHAT’S HOT?

1.e4 lost its magic towards the end in Nice. Out of the blue Black

won three games with the Sicilian Kan Variation. Kamsky-Topalov

and Topalov-Kamsky strangely enough were very similar with White

taking on a6 and Black playing ¤f3! to open up the long diagonal

for ¥a8. Morozevich beat Anand with 1.e4 d6 2.d4 ¤f6 3.¤c3 e5!?,

which we explain below. Last week’s Game of the Week Karjakin-

Morozevich with Black allowing ¤c7+ was repeated in Kamsky-

Morozevich, with White playing the novelty 9.£e1!?.

Score

More positive news for the king’s pawn opening in the Dutch League

where national champion Jan Smeets put the Open Ruy Lopez

under theoretical pressure.

Moving on to 1.d4, the Semi-Slav was avoided in Nice during most

of the tournament, but towards the end it was played five times.

Black kept himself comfortably in the Moscow Variation (6.¥xf6), but

in our Game of the Week he suffered a painful defeat in the Anti-

Moscow Gambit (6.¥h4). In the diagram position White has many

dangerous moves and Black has to be prepared for all of them.

In the German league some Avrukh analysis on the Queen’s Gambit

Accepted was tested in Khenkin-Gharamian.

Source: Megabase + TWIC, 2500+ only

Looking back at the Amber tournament we have to conclude that the French Defence, a very popular opening at club level, is not very

hot at the moment. The only game played with it in Nice, was duly won by White. In this

week’s grandmaster games with the French taken together, White mostly played 3.¤d2 (all

following Topalov!?), whereas 3.¤c3 is still the most critical move theoretically speaking.

WHAT’S NOT?

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ChessVibes OPENINGS what’s hot and what’s not?

No. 13, April 1, 2009

Deep Kramnik preparation in the Anti-Moscow

Kramnik inished his Amber tournament with a strong inal sprint that resulted in a shared

second spot with Anand. In the last round the former World Champion used some very deep

opening preparation in his game against Leko. A new blow for the Anti-Moscow?

GAME OF THE WEEK

Kramnik,V (2759) - Leko, P (2751)

Nice (Amber blindfold), 26 March 2009

D43 Semi-Slav, Anti-Moscow Gambit, 9.¥e2

only after 17.axb5 (17.¥g4 h5!) 17...axb5 18.d5

the freeing 18...¥f8.

17.¥g4 ¦d8 18.axb5N

The database mentions a blitz game between

Kramnik and Shirov with the notation stopping

after 18.¤d5 (draw). If that ’ s correct, the text is

the first new move.

18...axb5 19.¥xf8 ¢xf8

After 19...¤xf8 20.¦a7! any exd4 gets answered

by e5! and the ¢ is stuck on e8.

20.¥xd7 ¦xd7 21.dxe5 £e6 22.£h5 £xe5

Maybe Black should try to confuse the issue

with 22...b4!?

23.f4!

Opening the f-file for the rooks.

23...£xf4 24.¦f1 £e5 25.¦f5 £e6 26.¦af1 ¢g7

26...¦h7 looks like a more stubborn defence, since

the black ¢ stays away from potential ¤ checks.

27.¤e2!

The knight is joining in for a direct attack on the

enemy king.

27...¦f8 28.¤g3

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14.¥h5 ¥f8 15.¥xf8 ¦xf8 16.e5 £b6 was proven

to be OK for Black in some important games

by Anand. After 14.¦e1 Black can choose

between 14...¥f8 and the sharper 14...c5!?. A

very direct approach is 14.e5 c5 15.¥h5 ¥f8

16.d5, but analysis suggests that Black is fine,

starting with 16...¥xd6. Miton ’ s 14.b4 hasn ’ t got

any more testing since it was first played and

CVO editor Ris invented yet another option with

14.d5!? which brought a quick attacking win:

14...¤e5 15.dxe6 ¤d3 16.e5 ¥xe5 17.exf7+

¢xf7 18.¥h5+ ¢g7 19.¥xe5+ ¤xe5 20.£e2

¤g6 21.¦ad1 £c7 22.¥xg6 ¢xg6 23.£e6+ ¢h5

24.¤e4 ¥c8 25.¤g3+ 1–0 Ris-Kvisla, Gibraltar

2007.

14...e5 15.¦e1!?

A very tricky new attempt to refute the whole

black setup. 15.d5 c5 16.b4 £b6 17.bxc5 ¤xc5

18.¥xc5 £xc5 19.axb5 axb5 20.¦xa8+ ¥xa8

21.£a1 0–0 22.£a5 ¦b8 23.¦b1 ¥f8 was OK for

Black in Gustafsson-Aronian, Khanty Mansiysk

2007. 15.¥g4 exd4 16.e5 c5 17.¦e1 (17.¥f3

¤xe5! 18.¥xb7 £xd6 19.¥xa8 0–0 gives Black

good compensation for the rook) 17...¤xe5!

18.¥xe5 0–0 19.¥xg7 ¢xg7 20.¤e2 f5 21.¥h5

f4 22.b4 was played in Kramnik-Aronian, Wijk

aan Zee 2008, which was eventually won by

White after 110 moves. Here 22...d3!? 23.bxc5

b4 has been suggested by Anand and actually

Black ’ s position looks very attractive.

15...£f6

15...exd4 16.e5! dxc3 17.¥h5! is the point of

White ’ s previous move, which is worked out

in the Rybka 3 book: 17...¤f8 18.£f3 £d7

19.e6 ¤xe6 20.¦xe6+! ¢d8 21.¥xf7 c2 (21...

cxb2 22.¦d1 ¢c8 23.¦e7 £xd6 24.£f5+ ¢b8

25.¦xd6+-) 22.¥g3 ¥xb2 23.¦ae1+-. Black

does have an interesting alternative in 15...h5!?

followed by ¦h6! to battle the dominating bishop

on d6.

16.¥a3 ¥f8

Black should consider starting with 16...¦d8 and

1.d4 ¤f6 2.c4 e6 3.¤f3 d5 4.¤c3 c6

After an interesting move order we have landed

in the Semi-Slav.

5.¥g5 h6 6.¥h4

The Anti-Moscow Gambit. In Nice Black scored

2.5 out of 4 after 6.¥xf6 £xf6 7.e3 ¤d7 8.¥d3

dxc4 9.¥xc4 g6!.

6...dxc4 7.e4 g5 8.¥g3 b5 9.¥e2

For 9.¤e5 h5 10.h4 g4 11.¥e2 b4!? see CVO 4

whereas 11...¥b7 transposes to the next note.

9...¥b7 10.0–0

10.h4 g4 11.¤e5 h5 12.0–0 ¤bd7 13.£c2

(13.¤xf7!? is the Bosboom treatment of the

position, which he qualified as “maybe not

correct, but quite difficult for Black to handle”.

More can be found in the PGN file.) 13...¤xe5

14.¥xe5 ¥g7 15.b3!? (15.¦ad1 and 15.¥g3!?

are the alternatives) 15...0–0! was the strong

novelty from Grischuk-Aronian, Linares 2009,

mentioned in CVO 9.

10...¤bd7 11.¤e5 ¥g7

Kramnik himself played 11...¥b4!? against

Miton at the Olympiad, Dresden 2008.

12.¤xd7

In CVO 0 we analysed 12.¤xf7!? from the famous

game Topalov-Kramnik, Wijk aan Zee 2008.

12...¤xd7 13.¥d6 a6

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Amazingly, so far this was all preparation by

Kramnik, some stuff he had already looked at

before the World Championship in Mexico 2007.

28...c5 29.¦f6!

After the following exchange, the white queen

and knight are a killing attacking duo.

29...£xf6 30.¦xf6 ¢xf6 31.£xh6+ ¢e7

32.¤f5+ ¢e8 33.¤d6+ ¢e7 34.e5 ¦g8 35.£f6+

¢f8 36.e6 1–0

KRAMNIK - LEKO

14.a4

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ChessVibes OPENINGS what’s hot and what’s not?

No. 13, April 1, 2009

THIS WEEK’S HARVEST

Open Ruy Lopez, 9.¤bd2

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1.e4 e5 2.¤f3 ¤c6 3.¥b5 a6 4.¥a4

¤f6 5.0–0 ¤xe4 6.d4 b5 7.¥b3 d5

8.dxe5 ¥e6 9.¤bd2 ¤c5 10.c3 ¥e7

11.¥c2 d4 12.¤b3 d3 13.¥b1 ¤xb3

14.axb3 ¥f5 15.¥e3 0–0 16.¦e1 £d5

17.¥d4 d2 18.¦e2 ¥xb1 19.¦xb1 ¤xd4

20.¤xd4 ¥g5 21.g3 c5 22.¤f5

Caro-Kann Advance

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1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 ¥f5

4.¤f3 e6 5.¥e2 c5 6.¥e3 £b6

7.¤c3 ¤c6 8.0–0 £xb2

Philidor, rare lines

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1.e4 d6 2.d4 ¤f6 3.¤c3 e5

4.¤ge2 ¥e7 5.g3 c6 6.¥g2 b5

7.0–0 0–0 8.a3 ¤bd7 9.h3 ¦b8

QGA, 7.¥b3

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1.d4 d5 2.c4 dxc4 3.e3 ¤f6 4.¥xc4 e6

5.¤f3 c5 6.0–0 a6 7.¥b3 b5 8.a4 b4

9.e4 ¥b7 10.e5 ¤e4 11.¤bd2 ¤xd2

12.¥xd2 cxd4 13.¤g5 ¤d7 14.f4 ¤c5

15.f5 ¤xb3 16.£xb3 £d5 17.£g3 h6

18.fxe6 hxg5 19.exf7+ ¢d7 20.¦ac1

£e6 21.¥xg5

Last week we saw that in the game

Karjakin-Morozevich, also at the

Amber Tournament, Black was

doing fine after the spectacular

9.¤b5 c4!. We didn't have to wait

long for the next test since Kamsky

tried 9.£e1!? in his last-round

encounter with Morozevich. Of

course we like the brave 9...0–0–0

but after 10.¦b1 £xc2 11.¥b5

Black may have to replace the

game's 11...¥g4 by the developing

11...¤ge7. In the game Kamsky

got a slight plus almost by force,

though the game ended in a draw.

Since Black cannot reach the

classical Philidor with 1.e4 e5 2.¤f3

d6 3.d4 ¤f6 because of 4.dxe5!

¤xe4 5.£d5!, he often tries the

Pirc move order with 1.e4 d6 2.d4

¤f6 3.¤c3 e5!. The ending 4.dxe5

doesn't offer White much and 4.¤f3

allows 4...¤bd7 with a classical

Philidor, so that's why Anand chose

4.¤ge2!? against Morozevich. He

should have continued in style with

10.g4 though, since in the game

he lost the initiative and had to

acknowledge defeat after an ugly

blunder.

11...d4 is known as a very solid

line since the ending after 13.¤xc5

is just a tiny edge for White. With

13.¥b1 the stakes are raised.

Stellwagen-Svetushkin, Dresden

2008 continued 22...£e6 23.¤d6

£g6 24.h4 ¥h6 and now White

could have grabbed the initiative

with 25.h5!. After 22...¦ad8 23.f4 De

Jong couldn't solve Black's problems

either in his game against Smeets.

The diagram position is the final

position on p.449 of Avrukh's

remarkable book Grandmaster

repertoire: 1.d4, volume 1 . Avrukh

concludes "It is hard to believe that

Black can resist this attack" and

while he may still be right, that is

just what Black did in the practical

test Khenkin-Gharamian. Deep

analysis is required to judge moves

like 27.¢f1!?.

OPENING EXPERT

Who: Levon Aronian

Born: October 6, 1982

Nationality: Armenia

Rating:

Expertise:

White: Closed Games

Black: Marshall & Semi-Slav

Why:

Unbeatable with Black, very

2754

dangerous with White

Aronian has won the Amber tournament for the second time in a row. In early interviews he created the impression

that his openings are weak, but just like last week ’ s expert Jan Gustafsson, Aronian plays extremely principled

stuff and is very succesful with it. As an example we give his blindfold game against Radjabov in the PGN.

www.chessvibes.com/openings

ChessVibes Openings is a weekly PDF magazine that covers the latest news on chess openings. Which openings are hot in top level chess?

Which are not? Editors IM Merijn van Delft & IM Robert Ris keep you updated once a week! Singles issues cost € 1. You can subscribe too:

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