exd5!

09.01.2010
– This event is held in a four-year cycle, and this year, in spite of the absence of China, it is fielding a dozen players rated 2700 or higher. After four rounds Armenia and USA lead, in match and board points, with Russia, Israel and India tied for 3-5 on match points. You can watch the games on the official site and on Playchess. Illustrated report.

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Bursa, Turkey

The town, which has been known since 202 B.C., was originally Greek and called
Prousa, later turned to Brusa and then, by r-metathesis,
into today's Bursa. The population is 2.5 million, making it the fourth-largest
city in Turkey.

Use mouse to pan and zoom View
Larger Map

The city is frequently cited as "Yesil Bursa" (meaning "Green
Bursa") because of its parks
and gardens, as well as to the vast forests in rich variety that extend in its
surrounding region

A cable car up to Mount Uludağ, which towers behind the city and is
a famous ski resort

This, incidentally, is what Mount Uludağ looks like in winter

Bursa Castle, which was originally built in the first century BC

Ulu Cami (the Great Mosque) is a 14th century landmark of early Ottoman
architecture

World Team Championship 2010

The World Team Championship, which is organised every four years, but has been
delayed by one year this time, is taking place in Bursa from January 3rd to
14th 2010. The teams are from Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Israel, USA, India,
Brazil, Egypt, Turkey and Greece. Top players are Levon Aronian (2786), Vugar
Gashimov (2758), Boris Gelfand (2758), Alexander Morozevich (2750), Teimour
Radjabov (2748), Alexander Grischuk (2736), Dmitry Jakovenko (2736), Shakhriyar
Mamedyarov (2719), Hikaru Nakamura (2715), Evgeny Tomashevsky (2708), Vladimir
Malakhov (2706), Vladimir Akopian (2700), Nikita Vityugov (2694), Gabriel Sargissian
(2676), Pentala Harikrishna (2672), Alexander Onischuk (2672), Emil Sutovsky
(2666) and Krishnan Sasikiran (2653).

The playing hall in Bursa

In the first round Azerbaijan beat Armenia, with Shakhriyar Mamedyarov getting
the deciding point from Arman Pashikian. Turkey dutifully lost to the USA, with
Nakamura and Onischuk beating Kivanc and Mustafa, but the round was marked by
a very nice bishop sacrifice win by the Turkish player IM Emre Can:

Can,E (2442) - Shulman,Y (2624) [C03]
7th World Team Championship Bursa TUR (1), 05.01.2010
1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nd2 Be7 4.Bd3 c5 5.dxc5 Nf6 6.Qe2 0-0 7.Ngf3 a5 8.0-0
Na6 9.e5 Nd7 10.c4 Ndxc5 11.Bb1 Nb4 12.Rd1 Qb6 13.Nb3 dxc4 14.Qxc4 Nxb3 15.axb3
Rd8 16.Bd2 Bd7 17.Bg5 Bxg5

18.Bxh7+ Kxh7 19.Nxg5+ Kg8 20.Rd6 Qb5 21.Qe4 f5 22.Qh4 Qxe5 23.f4 Qxb2
24.Rad1 Nd5 25.R6xd5 exd5 26.Re1 Qd4+ 27.Kh1 Qe4 28.Qh7+ Kf8 29.Qh8+ Ke7 30.Qxg7+
Kd6 31.Nxe4+ fxe4 32.Qe5+ Kc6 33.b4 Kb6 34.Qd6+ Ka7 35.Ra1 Bc6 36.Qc5+ Kb8 37.b5
Bxb5 38.Qxb5 a4 39.Qb6 Rd7 40.Qe6 Rc7 41.Qe8+ Rc8 42.Qe5+ Ka7 43.Qxd5 1-0.
The game has been analysed for the ChessBase
Magazine blog by GM Rainer Knaak: Click
to replay.

Emre Can, one of the young Turkish talents, in his game against Yuri Shulman

In the second round Armenia beat Israel, with Levon Aronian beating Boris Gelfand
in the highest-ranked game of the event. The team from USA beat India 3-1, with
Hikaru Nakamura and Alexander Onischuk scoring against Krishnan Sasikiran and
Pentala Harikrishna repectively. But the big shocker was the 2½:1½
win of Greece over – would you believe it? – Russia. Morozevich
and Tomashevsky both lost, to Papaioannou and Banikas, while Jakovenko was able
to beat Kotronias and Vitiugov drew against Mastrovasilis.

Boris Gelfand (right) about to lose against Mr Cool Levon Aronian from Armenia

Indian GM Krishnan Sasikiran

In round three India struck back, against Azerbaijan, with Sasikiran beating
Vugar Gashimov and Ganguly beating Guseinov (Gopal lost to Mamedyarov). Russia
beat the USA, with Malakhov and Vitiugov beating Shulman and Akobian respectively.

Round four

Russia beat Azerbaijan, with Grischuk and Malakhov scoring against Gashimov
and Mamedov (but with Morozevich losing to Mamedyarov). Here are all results
of this round:

All four round results

Standings after four rounds

#	Team	win	draw	loss	MP	BP
1	Armenia	3	0	1	6	10.0
2	USA	3	0	1	6	10.0
3	Russia	3	0	1	6	9.5
4	Israel	3	0	1	6	9.5
5	India	3	0	1	6	9.0
6	Azerbaijan	2	0	2	4	8.5
7	Greece	1	0	3	2	7.0
8	Brazil	1	0	3	2	7.0
9	Egypt	1	0	3	2	6.0
10	Turkey	0	0	4	0	3.5

Armenia and USA lead, in match and board points, with Russia, Israel and India
tied for 3-5 on match points. Azerbaijan is a disappointing sixth, but will
probably demolish Egypt on Saturday, while India battles Armenia and Israel
the USA. Russia has an easy opponent, Turkey, and should edge its way to the
top.

Links Official tournament site All games in PGN The games are being broadcast live on the official web site and on the chess server Playchess.com. If you are not a member you can download the free PGN reader ChessBase Light, which gives you immediate access. You can also use the program to read, replay and analyse PGN games. New and enhanced: CB Light 2009!

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05.01.2010
– According to the current FIDE rankings Magnus Carlsen is the strongest player in the world. But his rating of 2810 is not the highest ever. That was achieved by Garry Kasparov, who in the July 1999 FIDE list reached 2851 points. Two other players have at some stage had higher ratings than Magnus. Here's a list of all Super-GMs (over 2700) and their top ratings.

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Top Ratings of Super-GM

Three years ago Przemek Jahr of Pila, Poland, sent us a
list of all players who had reached a rating of 2700 or higher, giving their
highest ever ratings and the year and the FIDE list in which it was achieved.
Chess fan Kostantin Ikonomovski of Jankovec, Macedonia, has been updating this
list meticulously and sent us the latest version that incorporates all list
up to the January
1st 2010 FIDE rankings.

Konstantin is a member of the amater team of Alkaloid for many years; "That
meant that I used to have four extra vacations every year on company expences,"
he writes, "always in some wonderful places throughout the former Yugoslavia.
I carry beautiful memories of this."

Addendum: the publication of this list under the original
front page title "The strongest players of all time" has led to
some furious messages from readers who blame "rating inflation"
for putting Bobby Fischer in place nine. We have sought to placate them with
a title change ("highest rated players") and understand that we
will have to (sigh) come back to this subject again soon.

Addendum 2: We have made some corrections in the list.
Carlsen has switched places with Kramnik, whose highest rating was 2809, not
2811. Grischuk was corrected and is now one place lower, and Sergey Tiviakov
was removed from the list, since his 2700 rating in October 2005 was corrected
to 2699.

Top ten rated players of all time

The highest rating ever, by Garry Kasparov, is 38 points more than any other
player in history. Five players have crossed the 2800 mark, five players have
come within twenty points of it. Here's the complete table.

Super-GMs who achieved a 2700 or higher rating

#	Surname, Name	Nat.	Born	Max	When	01.10
1	Kasparov, Garry	RUS	1963	2851	1999.07	2812
2	Topalov, Veselin	BUL	1975	2813	2006.07	2805
3	Carlsen, Magnus	NOR	1990	2810	2010.01	2810
4	Kramnik, Vladimir	RUS	1975	2809	2002.01	2788
5	Anand, Viswanathan	IND	1969	2803	2006.04	2790
6	Morozevich, Alexander	RUS	1977	2788	2008.07	2732
7	Ivanchuk, Vassily	UKR	1969	2787	2007.10	2749
8	Aronian, Levon	ARM	1982	2786	2009.11	2781
9	Fischer, Robert	USA	1943	2785	1972.04	2785
10	Karpov, Anatoly	RUS	1951	2780	1994.07	2619
11	Svidler, Peter	RUS	1976	2765	2006.01	2744
12	Leko, Peter	HUN	1979	2763	2005.04	2739
13	Radjabov, Teimour	AZE	1987	2761	2009.01	2733
14	Gelfand, Boris	ISR	1968	2761	2010.01	2761
15	Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar	AZE	1985	2760	2008.01	2741
16	Jakovenko, Dmitry	RUS	1983	2760	2009.01	2730
17	Gashimov, Vugar	AZE	1986	2759	2010.01	2759
18	Shirov, Alexei	ESP	1972	2755	2008.01	2723
19	Adams, Michael	ENG	1971	2755	2000.07	2694
20	Movsesian, Sergei	SVK	1978	2751	2009.01	2704
21	Wang, Yue	CHN	1987	2749	2010.01	2749
22	Grischuk, Alexander	RUS	1983	2748	2009.04	2736
23	Kamsky, Gata	USA	1974	2745	1996.07	2693
24	Ponomariov, Ruslan	UKR	1983	2743	2002.04	2737
25	Bareev, Evgeny	RUS	1966	2739	2003.10	2643
36	Eljanov, Pavel	UKR	1983	2736	2010.01	2736
27	Polgar, Judith	HUN	1976	2735	2005.07	2682
28	Nakamura, Hikaru	USA	1987	2735	2009.09	2708
29	Karjakin Sergey	RUS	1990	2732	2008.01	2720
30	Bacrot, Etienne	FRA	1983	2731	2005.04	2713
31	Vachier-Laqrave, Maxime	FRA	1990	2730	2010.01	2730
32	Navara, David	CZE	1985	2725	2006.10	2708
33	Alekseev, Evgeny	RUS	1985	2725	2009.09	2703
34	Ni, Hua	CHN	1983	2724	2009.04	2657
35	Dominguez Perez, Lenier	CUB	1983	2721	2009.04	2712
36	Malakhov, Vladimir	RUS	1980	2716	2009.09	2716
37	Salov, Valery	RUS	1964	2715	1995.01	2644
38	Wang Hao	CHN	1989	2715	2010.01	2715
39	Van Wely, Loek	NED	1972	2714	2001.10	2652
40	Bu, Xiangzhi	CHN	1985	2714	2008.10	2682
41	Akopian, Vladimir	ARM	1971	2713	2006.07	2700
42	Cheparinov, Ivan	BUL	1986	2713	2008.01	2660
43	Short, Nigel	ENG	1965	2712	2004.04	2707
44	Sasikiran, Krishnan	IND	1981	2711	2009.01	2664
45	Vellejo-Pons Francisco	ESP	1982	2711	2009.11	2711
46	Beliavsky, Alexander	SLO	1953	2710	1997.07	2657
47	Motylev Alexander	RUS	1979	2710	2009.07	2697
48	Almasi Zoltan	HUN	1976	2710	2010.01	2710
49	Tomashevsky Evgeny	RUS	1987	2708	2009.11	2705
50	Nisipeanu, Liviu-Dieter	ROM	1976	2707	2005.10	2681
51	Kasimdzhanov, Rustam	UZB	1979	2706	2001.10	2702
52	Sokolov, Ivan	BIH	1968	2706	2004.01	2649
53	Tal, Mikhail	LAT	1936	2705	1980.01	2705
54	Dreev, Alexey	RUS	1969	2705	2003.10	2650
55	Milov, Vadim	SUI	1972	2705	2008.07	2644
56	Jobava Baadur	GEO	1983	2704	2010.01	2704
57	Rublevski, Sergei	RUS	1974	2703	2009.07	2697
58	Krasenkow, Michal	POL	1963	2702	2000.07	2656
59	Smirin, Ilia	ISR	1966	2702	2001.07	2668
60	Khalifman, Alexander	RUS	1968	2702	2001.10	2616
61	Azmaiparashvili, Zurab	GEO	1960	2702	2003.07	2637
62	Bologan, Viktor	MDA	1971	2700	2005.04	2692
63	Naiditsch Arkadij	GER	1985	2700	2008-04	2687

Colour codes: Veteran active, Retired,
Deceased

See also articles by Jeff Sonas

• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part I
• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part II
• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part III
• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part IV
• What was the
  strongest tournament of all time?
• Rating inflation
  – its causes and possible cures

Copyright
ChessBase

Read Full Post »

05.01.2010
– According to the current FIDE rankings Magnus Carlsen is the strongest player in the world. But his rating of 2810 is not the highest ever. That was achieved by Garry Kasparov, who in the July 1999 FIDE list reached 2851 points. Two other players have at some stage had higher ratings than Magnus. Here's a list of all Super-GMs (over 2700) and their top ratings.

Andrew Martin:
The Trompowsky - The easy way - 2nd Edition
Thirty years ago the Trompowsky opening was almost totally unknown. It took a few spectacular games by Rafael Vaganian to bring 2.Bg5 into the limelight, and after that, the die was cast. Today 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 is used by many of the best players in the world and a whole body of complicated theory has built up.
More information...

Top Ratings of Super-GM

Three years ago Przemek Jahr of Pila, Poland, sent us a
list of all players who had reached a rating of 2700 or higher, giving their
highest ever ratings and the year and the FIDE list in which it was achieved.
Chess fan Kostantin Ikonomovski of Jankovec, Macedonia, has been updating this
list meticulously and sent us the latest version that incorporates all list
up to the January
1st 2010 FIDE rankings.

Konstantin is a member of the amater team of Alkaloid for many years; "That
meant that I used to have four extra vacations every year on company expences,"
he writes, "always in some wonderful places throughout the former Yugoslavia.
I carry beautiful memories of this."

Top ten players of all time

The highest rating ever, by Garry Kasparov, is 38 points more than any other
player in history. Five players have crossed the 2800 mark, five players have
come within twenty points of it. Here's the complete table.

Super-GMs who achieved a 2700 or higher rating

#	Surname, Name	Nat.	Born	Max	When	01.10
1	Kasparov, Garry	RUS	1963	2851	1999.07	2812
2	Topalov, Veselin	BUL	1975	2813	2006.07	2805
3	Kramnik, Vladimir	RUS	1975	2811	2002.01	2788
4	Carlsen, Magnus	NOR	1990	2810	2010.01	2810
5	Anand, Viswanathan	IND	1969	2803	2006.04	2790
6	Morozevich, Alexander	RUS	1977	2788	2008.07	2732
7	Ivanchuk, Vassily	UKR	1969	2787	2007.10	2749
8	Aronian, Levon	ARM	1982	2786	2009.11	2781
9	Fischer, Robert	USA	1943	2785	1972.04	2785
10	Karpov, Anatoly	RUS	1951	2780	1994.07	2619
11	Svidler, Peter	RUS	1976	2765	2006.01	2744
12	Leko, Peter	HUN	1979	2763	2005.04	2739
13	Radjabov, Teimour	AZE	1987	2761	2009.01	2733
14	Gelfand, Boris	ISR	1968	2761	2010.01	2761
15	Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar	AZE	1985	2760	2008.01	2741
16	Jakovenko, Dmitry	RUS	1983	2760	2009.01	2730
17	Gashimov, Vugar	AZE	1986	2759	2010.01	2759
18	Shirov, Alexei	ESP	1972	2755	2008.01	2723
19	Adams, Michael	ENG	1971	2755	2000.07	2694
20	Movsesian, Sergei	SVK	1978	2751	2009.01	2704
21	Grischuk, Alexander	RUS	1983	2750	2009.04	2736
22	Wang, Yue	CHN	1987	2749	2010.01	2749
23	Kamsky, Gata	USA	1974	2745	1996.07	2693
24	Ponomariov, Ruslan	UKR	1983	2743	2002.04	2737
25	Bareev, Evgeny	RUS	1966	2739	2003.10	2643
36	Eljanov, Pavel	UKR	1983	2736	2010.01	2736
27	Polgar, Judith	HUN	1976	2735	2005.07	2682
28	Nakamura, Hikaru	USA	1987	2735	2009.09	2708
29	Karjakin Sergey	RUS	1990	2732	2008.01	2720
30	Bacrot, Etienne	FRA	1983	2731	2005.04	2713
31	Vachier-Laqrave, Maxime	FRA	1990	2730	2010.01	2730
32	Navara, David	CZE	1985	2725	2006.10	2708
33	Alekseev, Evgeny	RUS	1985	2725	2009.09	2703
34	Ni, Hua	CHN	1983	2724	2009.04	2657
35	Dominguez Perez, Lenier	CUB	1983	2721	2009.04	2712
36	Malakhov, Vladimir	RUS	1980	2716	2009.09	2716
37	Salov, Valery	RUS	1964	2715	1995.01	2644
38	Wang Hao	CHN	1989	2715	2010.01	2715
39	Van Wely, Loek	NED	1972	2714	2001.10	2652
40	Bu, Xiangzhi	CHN	1985	2714	2008.10	2682
41	Akopian, Vladimir	ARM	1971	2713	2006.07	2700
42	Cheparinov, Ivan	BUL	1986	2713	2008.01	2660
43	Short, Nigel	ENG	1965	2712	2004.04	2707
44	Sasikiran, Krishnan	IND	1981	2711	2009.01	2664
45	Vellejo-Pons Francisco	ESP	1982	2711	2009.11	2711
46	Beliavsky, Alexander	SLO	1953	2710	1997.07	2657
47	Motylev Alexander	RUS	1979	2710	2009.07	2697
48	Almasi Zoltan	HUN	1976	2710	2010.01	2710
49	Tomashevsky Evgeny	RUS	1987	2708	2009.11	2705
50	Nisipeanu, Liviu-Dieter	ROM	1976	2707	2005.10	2681
51	Kasimdzhanov, Rustam	UZB	1979	2706	2001.10	2702
52	Sokolov, Ivan	BIH	1968	2706	2004.01	2649
53	Tal, Mikhail	LAT	1936	2705	1980.01	2705
54	Dreev, Alexey	RUS	1969	2705	2003.10	2650
55	Milov, Vadim	SUI	1972	2705	2008.07	2644
56	Jabava Baadur	GEO	1983	2704	2010.01	2704
57	Rublevski, Sergei	RUS	1974	2703	2009.07	2697
58	Krasenkow, Michal	POL	1963	2702	2000.07	2656
59	Smirin, Ilia	ISR	1966	2702	2001.07	2668
60	Khalifman, Alexander	RUS	1968	2702	2001.10	2616
61	Azmaiparashvili, Zurab	GEO	1960	2702	2003.07	2637
62	Bologan, Viktor	MDA	1971	2700	2005.04	2692
63	Tiviakov, Sergei	NED	1973	2700	2005.10	2662
64	Naiditsch Arkadij	GER	1985	2700	2008-04	2687

Colour codes: Veteran active, Retired,
Deceased

See also articles by Jeff Sonas

• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part I
• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part II
• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part III
• The Greatest
  Chess Player of All Time – Part IV
• What was the
  strongest tournament of all time?
• Rating inflation
  – its causes and possible cures

Copyright
ChessBase

Read Full Post »

31.12.2009
– FIDE has just released its January 1st 2010 rating list, and it has the 19-year-old Norwegian grandmaster Magnus Carlsen with 2810 in the number one slot, five points ahead of number two Veselin Topalov, and twenty points above World Champion Viswanathan Anand. Magnus is the youngest player to cross the 2800 mark and to top the world rankings.
Congratulations!

Andrew Martin:
The Trompowsky - The easy way - 2nd Edition
Thirty years ago the Trompowsky opening was almost totally unknown. It took a few spectacular games by Rafael Vaganian to bring 2.Bg5 into the limelight, and after that, the die was cast. Today 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 is used by many of the best players in the world and a whole body of complicated theory has built up.
More information...

FIDE January 2010 Rating List

Magnus Carlsen gained nine rating points in his last sixteen
games to come in at 2810 Elo points and to occupy the number one slot in the
world rankings. Below is this prodigy's rating progress in the last nine years.

In second place is Bulgarian GM Veselin Topalov, who lost
five points in four games (at the European Team Championships in Novi Sad),
followed by World Champion Viswanathan Anand, who lost two
points in nine games. Vladimir Kramnik is number four, having
won a whopping sixteen points in sixteen games. Kramnik displaced Levon
Aronian, who lost five points and is now in place five in the world
rankings.

Other notatble changes at the top: Vassily Ivanchuk has gained ten points and
is once again in the top ten. So is Chinese GM Wang Yue, who gained fifteen
points. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov gained 22 points, while Peter Leko lost 13, Teimour
Radjabov 15 and Alexander Morozevich 18 points.

FIDE January 1st 2010 – Top 100 Players

FIDE Top 100 Women January 2010

Nothing has changed: Judit Polgar is still almost 70 points ahead of her nearest
rival, Indian GM Koneru Humpy. Chinese wonder talent Hou Yifan continues to
move slowly towards the 2600 mark and we can expect her to soon be the third
female player in history to achive this.

Read Full Post »

• All available games
  in zipped PGN

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