Looks Familiar

John B. Henderson • February 17, 2023

The only supertournament on German soil this year is a newcomer to the elite-scene, the WR Chess Masters - named after the initials of its sponsor, Wadim Rosenstein - is now underway in downtown Dusseldorf, and runs 15 through 26 February. 


There’s something of an air of familiarity to the second supertournament of 2023 with seven of the ten participants also taking part in the recent Tata Steel Masters in Wik aan Zee: Dutch winner Anish Giri, Levon Aronian, Wesley So, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, Dommaraju Gukesh, Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa and Vincent Keymer; with Ian Nepomniachtchi, Andrey Esipenko and Jan-Krzysztof Duda completing the field.

All eyes will be on top seed and world No 2, Ian Nepomniachtchi to see if he can avoid the unmitigated disaster that befell China’s Ding Liren last month at Wijk aan Zee, so that the Russian, who is playing under the neutral FIDE flag, will go into their upcoming world title match - left vacant with Magnus Carlsen “abdicating” his title - at Astana in April with added confidence.


There was also a look of familiarity to one of the opening round games of the WR Chess Masters, as three-time US Champion Wesley So probably couldn’t believe his eyes as his opponent, Poland’s Jan-Krzysztof Duda, inexplicably walked into a famous tactical trap that was first played during the 1978 Buenos Aires Olympiad. Even your scribe remembers seeing this when he was a precocious young teenage chess fanatic, as he eagerly devoured the-then latest Chess Informant, the fabled Belgrade periodical that ruled when print was still king before the digital era.


This was a really big novelty first seen in the game Portisch-Radulov, and then a few days later, it was also used to good effect in Ribli-Ljubojevic, played in a more laissez faire time before the automatic digital recording of games, as the daily bulletins were printed the next day, and information from recent games wasn’t so “free-flowing” as it is now - hence the reason for Ribli being able to recycle the big Catalan novelty uncorked by his fellow Hungarian top-board teammate in a near carbon-copy win.


Round 1:

So 1-0 Duda

Aronian 1-0 Praggnanandhaa

Esipenko 1-0 Keymer

Nepomniachtchi ½-½ Abdusattorov

Giri ½-½ Gukesh


GM Wesley So - GM Jan-Krzysztof Duda

WR Chess Masters, (1)

Open Catalan

1.Nf3 d5 2.g3 Nf6 3.Bg2 c5 4.0-0 Nc6 5.d4 e6 6.c4 dxc4 7.Qa4 Bd7 8.Qxc4 If you thought you'd probably seen it all before in the Catalan, then you are probably correct, you have! But alas, in this game at least, Duda's chess education seems to be somewhat lacking. 8...cxd4 9.Nxd4 Rc8 10.Nc3 Nxd4 11.Qxd4 Bc5 12.Qh4 Bc6 13.Rd1 Qb6? Tempted by the "hanging fruit" on f2, Duda remarkably falls into a known tactical trap of four decades standing. Black should play instead 13...Qa5! that prevents the coming tactic, as Black can counter with ...Bxf2+ then ...Kxg7, as now there's no check on g5 as in the game. 14.Bxc6+ Rxc6 [see diagram] So probably couldn't believe his luck here, as Duda falls into what I always thought was a well-known tactic. 15.Bh6! Bf8 The only defence - and this is all still known from the published analysis of the above mentioned brace of 1978 Olympiad games. If 15...0-0 16.Bxg7 Bxf2+ 17.Kh1 Kxg7 18.Qg5+ Kh8 19.Qxf6+ Kg8 20.Ne4! Be3 21.Qe5 f5 (If 21...f6 22.Nxf6+ Rxf6 23.Qxf6 doesn't even bare thinking about.) 22.Rd7 winning. And also no use is 15...Bxf2+ 16.Kg2 gxh6 17.Qxf6 0-0 18.Qxf2 Qxb2 19.Ne4 with a big winning advantage. 16.Rd3! Simply threatening to double rooks on the d-file, and then crash home the attack. Also, as we see in the game, there are possibilities of a very annoying - and winning - Rb3 (or even Re3+) looming large. 16...Nd5 The d-file has to be blocked, even if it is a futile gesture, as anything else loses very quickly. One example being 16...Qxb2 17.Rb1 Qc2 18.Rc1 Qb2 19.Qf4! Rc8 20.Qa4+! b5 21.Qa6! and Black's position is on the brink. 17.Nxd5 exd5 18.Be3! Qxb2 The only thing Duda can do now is take the pawn and pray for a miracle that So somehow manages to mis-play this wonderful winning position. Not today, thank you very much! 19.Bd4 Qb4 20.Rb3 According to our Silicon Overlord, the clinical kill was 20.Qh5! as Black can't defend the d-pawn with 20...Qd6 down to 21.Re3+ Kd8 22.Rd1 and there's carnage coming down the d-file anyway. 20...Qe7 21.Qxe7+ Kxe7 Duda's king has somehow managed to survive the mating threats - but he's left with a total wreck of an endgame to have to forlornly play on with for a number of moves to make the game look more credible. 22.Rxb7+ Ke6 23.Rb8 h5 24.Rab1 h4 25.Kg2 Kf5 26.Kf3 hxg3 27.hxg3 Rc4 28.e3 Rc2 As Duda can't bring his rook or bishop into the game, I supposse he should have been resigning about here - but you play on regardless, hoping to scrape past the time control to make the loss look more respectable than it really is. We're all human, after all. 29.R1b5 Kg6 30.Rxd5 Rxa2 31.Rdd8 The rest is just "padding out" the game to the time control before the inevitable resignation. 31...Rh2 32.Rxf8 Raxf2+ 33.Ke4 f6 34.Rb7 a6 35.Ra8 Ra2 36.Raa7 Rh7 37.Kf3 Ra5 38.Rb6 Rg5 39.Kg2! Praying for 39.Rbxa6?! Rh3 40.Rc7 Rgxg3+ that would at least make White break a sweat to win - but So isn't going to play ball...nor break sweat! 39...a5 40.e4 Rg4 41.Kf3 Rg5 42.Be3 Re5 43.Bf4 Rc5 44.e5! Rh8 45.Rba6 Rd8 46.exf6 gxf6 47.Rxa5 Rc3+ 48.Kg4 1-0

The 42 Paradox

By John B. Henderson • October 2, 2023
Well, well, well. After rampaging his way through many of the finals and opponents throughout the 2023 Champions Chess Tour, Magnus Carlsen’s “final boss” reign came to a screeching halt in what proved to be an enthralling AI Cup Grand Final on Friday, as the favourite was beaten not once but in three games, and over two matches, by Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, who sensationally grabbed the last remaining spot in the Champions Tour Final in December. Earlier, Carlsen had defeated MVL in the final of the winners’ bracket, before the Frenchman gained the right to a rematch in the double-elimination contest by beating Ian Nepomniachtchi in the final of the losers’ bracket. In the Grand Final, buoyed up and firing on all cylinders, MVL beat Carlsen by a 2½-1½ score.

We'll Meet Again

By John B. Henderson • September 29, 2023
The self-proclaimed “final boss of chess” does what the final boss of chess does best of all: Magnus Carlsen beat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the final of the AI Cup winners’ bracket, the sixth and final leg of the 2023 Champions Chess Tour regular season, to reach yet another Grand Final in the novel double-elimination contest. But it wasn’t without an epic bare-knuckle street fight from both players, as MVL proved to be a worthy opponent for what looked to be an unstoppable Carlsen, who narrowly prevailed in the Armageddon to take the match 3-2. "This is the sort of thing that happens when you play Sicilians in every game," said a magnanimous Carlsen in victory after four fighting Sicilians left the match tied at 2-2.

Tiers For Fears

By John B. Henderson • September 27, 2023
Fans were treated to arguably the greatest online rivalry in chess history recently, with the Chess.com Speed Chess Championship Grand Final showdown between Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura seeing the Norwegian narrowly snatch victory by a solitary win to end the American speed maven’s hopes of a sixth successive victory. But Carlsen’s narrow win left the salivating fans feeling they’d been denied seeing this epic gladiatorial speed contest going into overtime - but they didn’t have to wait long for the rivalry redux, as a couple of days later, both Carlsen and Nakamura went head-to-head yet again in the opening day of the AI Cup, the sixth and final leg of the 2023 Champions Chess Tour regular season.

Bossing It

By John B. Henderson • September 25, 2023
Magnus Carlsen more than lived up to his self-proclamation of being “The Final Boss of Chess” with a revenge-is-sweet narrow victory over fellow chess influencer Hikaru Nakamura, as he denied his long-time arch-rival a sixth successive Chess.com Speed Chess Championship title last Friday. Last year, it was Nakamura who narrowly squeaked home by one point - this time, in yet another thrilling match consisting of three different speed limits - 5+1, 3+1 and 1+1 (more commonly known as ‘bullet’) - between the two speed titans, it again ended with the same scoreline, though this time seeing Carlsen triumph by a solitary win after two pulsating hours of thrilling play, as he took the $150,000 2023 Speed Chess Championship presented by Coinbase, 13.5-12.5.

Death, Taxes, Magnus & Hikaru

By John B. Henderson • September 22, 2023
With a smorgasbord of online chess events out there now, the granddaddy of them all is surely the Chess.com Speed Chess Championship , with a $150,000 prize fund that determines just who is the best blitz and bullet players. It has become the perennial fan-favourite with arguably the best viewing experience - and the fans are set for yet another spectacular finale later today, as the two rivals who dominate the roll of honour, Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura, get set for another explosive showdown in the 2023 final. Friday’s final and commentary, free to view, starts at 14:00 ET (11:00 PT; 20:00 CEST; 23:30 IST) on Chess.com. Carlsen and Nakamura have won each edition since the inaugural Speed Chess Championship event in 2016 - Carlsen won the first two speed titles before taking a hiatus, only for Nakamura to rule the roost, winning four more times.

A Messi Kid

By John B. Henderson • September 19, 2023
India today is a land of amazing young talents and prospects in chess, with the country seemingly having a never-ending production line of prodigies rolling off the factory conveyor belt. But for some countries, such as Argentina, prodigies only seem to come around with all the regularity of Halley’s Comet . One of the first notable post-war chess prodigies was Oscar Panno from Buenos Aires, who became the first world-class player born in South America. In 1953, at the age of 17, he became only the second World Junior Champion , having won the coveted youth title ahead of a strong cadre of future elite-level Grandmasters such as Boris Ivkov (who in 1951 was crowned the first World Junior Ch), Bent Larsen, and Fredrik Olafsson.

The Great Rook 'n' Roll Swindle

By John B. Henderson • September 14, 2023
“Chess is a cruel game. We all know that feeling when your position has gone awry and everything seems hopeless. You feel like resigning. But don’t give up! This is precisely the moment to switch to swindle mode. Master the art of provoking errors and you will be able to turn the tables and escape with a draw or sometimes even steal the full point!” So wrote David Smerdon, an Australian chess grandmaster and one of his country’s leading behavioural economists, on the back cover of his witty and wickedly entertaining, not to mention the much-lauded and deserving 2020 ECF Book of the Year winner, The Complete Chess Swindler (New in Chess).

No Country For Young Men

By John B. Henderson • September 11, 2023
With the top teenage talents being overshadowed in the Tata Steel Chess India Rapid in Kolkata by a dominant performance from seasoned veteran Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, there were hopes of a homeland comeback in the follow-on Blitz tournament - and one looked to be on the cards, only for another “old guy”, this time Alexander Grischuk, crashing the teenage party by capturing the second, even faster speed title. Early doors, all eyes were firmly on Rameshbabu “Pragg” Praggnanandhaa, with his flying start of a perfect 5/5 on the opening day of the two-day double-round contest. But that was as good as it got for the 18-year-old Candidate-qualifier, who could only finish the day on 6.5/9, and despite being the sole leader, he held what looked a very slender half-point lead over nearest rivals Santosh Vidit and Grischuk, ominously the only unbeaten player.

My Indian Summer

By John B. Henderson • September 8, 2023
The past couple of years have proved to be a major one for India - not only a global player with world leaders descending this week in New Delhi for the G20 Summit and recently successfully landing a spacecraft on the moon but now also a fully-fledged chess superpower, with many exciting young talents set to make the country a dominant force for the foreseeable future. Many would even speculate that Indian Chess could well turn into a hegemony, in much the same way as the Soviets dominated the chess scene in the 1945 post-war period until its collapse and ultimate dissolution in 1991. The latest big chess tournament to be held in India coincides with the G20, with the fifth Tata Steel Chess India Rapid & Blitz - a spinoff from the larger Dutch super-tournament, the Tata Steel Chess Masters in Wijk aan Zee - taking place 5-9 September in Kolkata.

Me & The Kids

By John B. Henderson • September 4, 2023
The fifth and latest leg of the Champions Chess Tour , the Julius Baer Generations Cup more than lived up to its name with the world No.1, Magnus Carlsen, after overpowering Alireza Firouzja in the winners’ final, to effortlessly cruise his way into the Grand Final, declaring: “It’s just me against the kids now!” After three clean kills that included a brace of back-to-back 2½-½ victories over Iranian Amin Tabatabaei and his old title foe Caruana, Carlsen proceeded to sweep Firouzja 3-0 to reach the Grand Final of the contest - but it wasn’t lost on the “old man” that non of his old rivals were left in the competition, and that meant that Denis Lazavik (16), Nodirbek Abdusattorov (18), and Firouzja (20) were the only three left standing to see who would go forward to meet him in the Grand Final.
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