Radjabov begins superbly at Corus

The Corus Chess Tournament 2007 is taking place from 12-28 January 2007, at the De Moriaan Community Centre, in Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands.

Corus is the main event in the chess world during the month of January. For many, it is considered the strongest event in the world, ahead of Linares and Dortmund, because of its unique line-up of 14 very tough players (the other events only field from 6 to 8).

After the first four rounds, the tournament leader is Teimour Radjabov, with 3.5/4. Radjabov has s far beaten van Wely, Shirov and Tiviakov - and could well have had a perfect score after missing and having to settle for a draw with Karjakin. However, it must be said that so far he's not faced any of the top three such as Topalov, Kramnik and Anand, who are all playing quite well and are on plus scores; Topalov hot on his heels with 3 points, and the other two on 2.5.

In the B group, the young Dutch GM Jan Smeets (2538) is also leading the field 3.5/4, a full point in front of five +2600 players: Eljanov, Bu, Nijboer, Jakovenko and Bologan. And finally in the C group another very young Russian star is shining: IM Ian Nepomniachtchi (16 years old with a 2587 rating) is leading with 3.5/4 ahead of Berg, Krasenkow, Bosboom, Hou Yifan (13!) and Negi all with 2.5. However, Ian has already defeated Krasenkov and Bosboom and tied with Berg, so things are looking good for him!

ICC is providing a very special coverage for this event. In the English channel, the famous journalist Michael “MIG” Greengard is hosting an audio show every round, with invited GM’s such as Benjamin, Federowicz and Christiansen. The Spanish channel is also featuring several titled players such as GM’s Miguel Illescas or Amador Rodríguez and IM’s Michael Rahal and Angel Martin. Finally, the French ICC partner Stéphan Laborde is also covering the event on the French channel.

ELO FED FLAG NAME RES NAME FLAG FED ELO 2678 UKR Karjakin ½-½ Motylev RUS 2647 2715 ESP Shirov 0-1 van Wely NED 2683 2682 NED Tiviakov ½-½ Topalov BUL 2783 2719 CZE Navara 0-1 Radjabov AZE 2729 2723 UKR Ponomariov ½-½ Kramnik RUS 2766 2779 IND Anand 1-0 Svidler RUS 2728 2744 ARM Aronian ½-½ Carlsen NOR 2690

Nº FLAG NAME Age FIDE Rk FED PTS 1 GM Teymour Radjabov 19 2729 11 AZE 4.5 2 GM Veselin Topalov 31 2783 1 BUL 3.5 - GM Viswanathan Anand 37 2779 2 IND 3.5 4 GM Vladimir Kramnik 31 2766 3 RUS 3.0 - GM Levon Aronian 24 2744 7 ARM 3.0 6 GM David Navara 21 2719 15 CZE 2.5 - GM Peter Svidler 30 2728 12 RUS 2.5 - GM Sergey Karjakin 17 2678 29 UKR 2.5 - GM Ruslan Ponomariov 23 2723 14 UKR 2.5 10 GM Alexander Motylev 27 2647 58 RUS 2.0 - GM Loek van Wely 34 2683 26 NED 2.0 12 GM Sergey Tiviakov 33 2682 27 NED 1.5 - GM Magnus Carlsen 16 2690 24 NOR 1.5 14 GM Alexey Shirov 34 2715 17 ESP 0.5

Summary of round-1 by GM Miguel Illescas

The inaugural round of the Corus Chess Tournament was a very peaceful one, with six draws and only one decisive game. One of the reasons may be that five of the highest rated players were conducting the black pieces, while only Topalov was playing white. In his game, the Bulgarian GM Vesselin Topalov continued the theoretical battle in the Slav, exactly one of the variations which were the main battlefield at Elista, and precisely versus one of Kramnik trainers, Alexander Motylev. The Russian equalized quite easily after the novelty 12.c5 which didnʼt change the equality evaluation in this particular line. Draw after 24 moves in a fairly equal endgame.

The other two favorites, Anand and Kramnik, got easy draws with black versus the Ukrainian young stars Ponomariov and Karjakin. Anand defended a classical Catalan and equalized effortlessly, agreeing a draw after 22 moves; the same can be said about Kramnik, who showed the better opening preparation in the Petroff's Defense: the draw came as a logical result by repetition of moves in an equal endgame.

Navara and Shirov both played aggressively with white against two of the strongest participants, Aronian and Svidler. The young Czech sacrificed a pawn and it looked like we were going to have some fun, but the disappointing outcome came soon when he was forced to repeat moves. The Latvian-born Spaniard (who now lives in Lithuania, I believe) got a very sharp position after his Russian opponentʼs favorite Grunfeld - but again both players were happy to settle for a draw after repeating positions on move 26. Another lackluster draw was Tiviakov-Carlsen in the  Alapin variation against the Sicilian, which soon ended peacefully after a massive exchange of pieces.

Final position van Wely (2683) - Radjabov (2729) Corus 2007 - Group-A (1), 01.13.2007 The only opening round winner was GM Teimour Radjabov, who took the sole lead after easily beating local Dutch star GM Loek van Wely. Radjabov got the better of a Kingʼs Indian to win a pawn and the superior position, and then completely outplayed the Dutchman, who was forced to resign just after the time control at move 40.

Summary of round-2 by IM Michael Rahal

The second round in Corus, Wijk aan Zee proved to be the opposite of the first round - with all the games played to a decisive end, save for the only draw conceeded funnily enough being Radjabov – Karjakin, the last game to finish. Radjabov had Queen + three pawns against Rook + Bishop + two pawns, but Karjakin sacrificed his bishop and successfully built a fortress along the third rank with his rook to save the draw.

Last years co-winner, GM Vishy Anand won his first game by defeating Russian GM Alexander Motylev on the Black side of a Poisoned Pawn Najdorf Sicilian. Motylev sacrificed three pawns for a dangerous attack, but after missing the draw with 28 Rxg7+, Anand soon wrapped up the game with some good defensive technique.

16-year-old GM Magnus Carlsen missed a clear win in his game against GM David Navarra. Carlsen sacrificed the exchange for a dangerous passed pawn on d6. In a complex position, Navarra blundered with 31…g5??, that would have allowed 32.c6! winning. However, the Norwegian missed it and went on to lose the game.

Four-time Russian champion GM Peter Svidler also progressed to 1.5 by grinding down Tiviakov’s dubious 2…Qd6 Scandinavian with the fashionable fianchetto variation. The Dutch GM was always a bit worse, and Svidler finished him off with some nice tactics.

The World Champion, GM Vladimir Kramnik is also tied for first place with 1.5/2 at the cost of Shirov, who played a very bad game. The Spaniard spent a lot of time in the opening, obviously unprepared and eventually fell into one of those technical squeezes that Kramnik plays so well. His technique was great, and slowly Kramnik achieved a winning position. Shirov then blundered a piece with a simple tactical shot.

GM Loek van Wely lost his second consecutive game against GM Veselin Topalov, who built up a very strong kingside attack in the white side on the White side of a Sicilian Najdorf. In  a spectacular game, Veselin just kept pushing the attack going on the kingside and finally broke through, although he had to be careful as van Wely was doing likewise on the queenside. 

Finally, GM Levon Aronian also progressed to join the chasing pack on 1.5 by defeating Ponomariov in a nice positional game with White. Aronian picked up three pawns with good technique, and even though there were opposite colored bishops on the board, Ponomariov had no option other than to resign.

Summary of round-3 by GM Amador Rodriguez

Teimour Radjabov took the clear lead again on 2.5/3 in Wijk aan Zee after defeating Alexei Shirov in a highly complex game. It’s remarkable that both his two wins came as Black from the same variation of the King’s Indian Defence. In the opening round, van Wely played 17.g4, after which his king was safe but eventually he lost when the black pieces penetrated through the queen side.

Today Shirov went for 17.Kg2, which lead to a position where he seemed to have great compensation for a pawn. What’s more, he was about to take back his material with interest. But Radjabov broke on the kingside with 27…h5 and 29…g5 with a a strong attack. Shirov went for sharp complications by sacrificing his queen - but after a series of complex moves, it proved not to be enough as Radjabov returned the queen to reach a technically winning ending an a exchange up.

The other win of the day came from Ponomariov with White against Carlsen. In an apparently tame position in the Slav, he took his knight to a4 on move 14th and after the careless 14…0-0 penetrated immediately with 15.Nb6 and 16 Nc8; a clever maneuver that lead to serious tactical problems that his younger opponent couldn't solve. Soon Carlsen was in dire straits and sacrificed his queen, but to no avail as he lost easily.

Anand-Aronian was also very entertaining game, where Anand tried to break the Marshall attack. At some point it seemed that he was about to do it, but Aronian played with imagination to save the half point.

From the remaining games, the one that attracted the most attention was between Karjakin and Topalov, being the last to finish. Throughout the game Karjakin took the best of the white-side of a sharp Sicilian Najdorf, posing great problems that Topalov could not solve. By the time they reached the first time control at move 40, Karjakin was close to winning with a full pawn to the better, a very solid structure and a safer king. But he allowed Topalov to exchange queens to go into a difficult rook ending, where Black had very practical drawing possibilities. As the endgame progressed, Karjakin was playing very well until he unexpectedly agreed to a draw in a position where he had very good chances to play on for a win without any risk.

Summary of round-4 by IM Michael Rahal

The fourth round at Corus has left us with a clear leader: Teimour Radjabov has started off very strongly and today he demolished Tiviakov’s Accelerated Dragon to lead the field on 3.5/4. All the rest of the games finished in draws with the exception of Topalov-Shirov (1-0), which leaves the Spanish GM languishing at the foot of the table after losing three games in a row.

Motylev-Aronian
The Armenian GM played the Classical Steinitz defence in the Ruy Lopez. It looked as if Motylev had a small space advantage after the opening, but the players decided to repeat moves, sealing the draw on move 22.

Carlsen-Anand
After losing two games-in-a-row, Carlsen played very solidly in a fashionable variation of the Sicilian Najdorf, English Attack with 6…e5 7.Nf3. Anand equalized easily; and both players agreed a draw on move 20.

Svidler-Ponomariov
Another Najdorf English Attack, this time with 6…e5 7.Nb3, the other main line. Ruslan played very well and reached a position in which he was at least a bit better, but then strangely offered Svidler a draw, which was quickly accepted.

Van Wely-Karjakin
The Dutch GM missed an opportunity to win his first game today. In a Nimzo Indian Defence, Karjakin misplayed the opening and lost a pawn for a very unclear compensation. However, the young Ukrainian counter-punched with kingside and, while Van Wely was trying to promote his a-pawn, by sacrificing a rook was able to secure the draw by repetition.

Corus 2007 - ICC Webcast line-up

ROUND and DATE HOST COMMENTATOR Round 6 Fri, Jan 19 Mig Greengard GM A. Rodríguez Stéphane Laborde GM Gregory Kaidanov Round 7 Sat, Jan 20 Mig Greengard IM A. Martín Stéphane Laborde IM Bill Paschall Round 8 Sun, Jan 21 NM Brian Wall GM A. Rodríguez Stéphane Laborde GM John Fedorowicz Rest Day Mon, Jan 22 Round 9 Tue, Jan 23 Mig Greengard IM M. Rahal Stéphane Laborde GM Joel Benjamin Round 10 We, Jan 24 Mig Greengard GM A. Rodríguez Stéphane Laborde GM Joel Benjamin Rest Day Thur, Jan 25 Round 11 Fri, Jan 26 Mig Greengard IM A. Martín Stéphane Laborde GM Larry Christiansen Round 12 Sat, Jan 27 Mig Greengard IM M. Rahal Stéphane Laborde GM Larry Christiansen Round 13 Sun, Jan 28 Mig Greengard GM M. Illescas Stéphane Laborde GM Larry Christiansen

Related information

• You can get more information in the ICC LIVE COVERAGE and ICC Webcast webpages.
• To watch the archived games, connect to ICC and type "lib Corus07".
• Also, visit the Corus 2007 official website.
• Video of Radjabov at Corus from ChessVibes.com.