Chess
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Your support makes all the difference.THE ANNUAL Biel Chess Festival is under way in the city - Bienne in French - in the west of Switzerland. As always there are many gradated sections, up to the top group which this time is a six-player double-rounder, from 19 to 30 July.
Clashing as it does with the Fide world championship in Las Vegas, this naturally consists of "refugees" from that event. But such is the random nature of the system of zonal tournaments that selected the final 100 in Las Vegas, that the top seed in Biel is the powerful Ukrainian Alexander Onischuk, who is currently rated 2,657, while the six together average 2,594 (category 14) - which would be about half-way up in Vegas.
Viktor Bologan from Moldavia started well with the impressive win below, and after a further victory the next day against the German Dimitrij Bunzmann he was already the sole leader. Bologan was set back on his heels, though, when the Israeli Boris Avrukh ground him down in round 3 and after a further round Avrukh led on 3/4 ahead of Bologan and Piket 2.5, Onischuk 2 and Pelletier and Bunzmann 1.
Few grandmasters entirely trust 2 ...Nc6 - the subject of an enthusiastic book by the American IM Georgi Orlov last year (The Black Knights' Tango, BT Batsford, pounds 12.99) - though Alex Yermolinsky used it to good effect against Kasparov himself in the penultimate round of the Erevan Olympiad in 1996. However, Kasaprov did win in the end.
As played, they transposed instead to something similar to the "Milner Barry" Variation of the 4 Qc2 Nimzo - 1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 Bb4 4 Qc2 Nc6. Pelletier reacted aggressively with 15 Be2, and 16 0-0-0 - 15 Bf1, for example, was less pugnacious; and the game became quite unclear after 16 ...b5.
17 cxb5 was sensible, since 17 dxc6 b4 18 axb4 axb4 19 Bxb4 Nxc6 20 Ba3 Nd4 gives Black abundant play; and 20 g4 was one possible improvement. The position looks about equal at the start of the ending after 27 ...Nxb7, but White's transfer of his rook to b5 was wrong - 29 Bd2, for example, looked much better. After his king got safely centralised to e6 Bologan had the advantage which quickly assumed massive proportions.
White: Yannick Pelletier
Black: Viktor Bologan
Nimzo-Indian 4 Qc2
1 d4 Nf6
2 c4 Nc6!?
3 Nf3 e6
4 Nc3 Bb4
5 Qc2 0-0
6 Bd2 d6
7 a3 Bxc3
8 Bxc3 Qe7
9 e3 a5
10 Bd3 e5
11 d5 Nb8
12 Nd2 c6
13 e4 Nh5
14 g3 Bh3
15 Be2 Nf6
16 0-0-0 b5
17 cxb5 cxd5
18 exd5 Bg2
19 Rhe1 Bxd5
20 Bf3 Nbd7
21 Ne4 Bxe4
22 Bxe4 Nxe4
23 Qxe4 Nc5
24 Qd5 Rfd8
25 Kb1 Kh8
26 Rc1 Qb7
27 Qxb7 Nxb7
28 Red1 f6
29 Rd5 Kg8
30 b6 Rdc8
31 a4 Kf7
32 Rb5 Ke6
33 b4 axb4
34 Rxb4 Rcb8
35 Kc2 Ra6
36 Ra1 Rba8
37 Kb3 Kd7
38 Bd2 Nc5+
39 Kc4 Kc6
40 Be3 d5+
41 Kc3 d4+
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