Chess Olympiad Dresden 2008 – Last day

Here is the link to live action:

http://schachlive.dresden2008.de/live.team.games.m.eng.html

7:40am. Our women are playing with Portugal, 1:2, our first board has winning chances.  Men are playing with Colombia,  1.5:0.5,  1st board down 2 pawns, but opponent’s king is not safe, 4th board has 2 queens.

On the “big screen” USA are beating Ukraine – 2:0 !!!

Here is the position from Natalia’s ( 1st board) game:

8:15am. Our men won already – 2:5-0.5, one more game. Natalia sacrifices a pawn, if it is accepted, White get essentually more active rook and king.

China losing to Armenia – 1:2.

8:26am. USA won the match – 2:5:0.5 with one more game, looks like they can get bronze medals.

8:40am. Fierce battle on the women’s first board.

8:55am.  Armenia won the Olympiad!  Crazy, crazy rook endgame on women’s first board continues. It’s the first time I am watching endgame like I would watch middlegame with let’s say castling to opposite sides and mutual attacks. It’s finished and it’s a draw, so women lost the match – 1.5:2.5.

9:30am. Israel get silver! Not clear who gets bronze yet, it will be decided on TB.

11:00am. USA gets bronze, women’s team too.

Canada – national team – 28th, women – 65th.

 

Chess Olympiad Dresden 2008 – Day 2

Friday, 9:47 EST.

So,  Olympiad started, some expected and unexpected results. You can see them, as well as pairings here:

http://chess-results.info/tnr16314.aspx?iframe=YES&css=1&wi=540&lan=1

Games begin today at 10am EST (4 pm CET), you can see them live here (not yet):

http://schachlive.dresden2008.de/live.team.games.m.eng.html

I decided to follow Carlsen – Meier (Germany) , Korchnoi (my favorite) – Kakageldyev ( Turkmenistan) and again our Canadian team. 

10:11am EST. Games started.  

10:30 am.  Carlsen exchanged queens, position looks equal.

Our women are playing with Costa-Rica, I hope they do better than yesterday, for now they look OK. Men outrate Bolivia by 100-200, I expect them to win.

Old guy wins a pawn on 11th move – go, Korchnoi, go!

1:30pm.  Carlsen drew, Korchnoi won, both our teams are winning.

2:30pm.  Both our teams won – 3.5:0.5, great.

 

Chess Olympiad Dresden 2008

First of all, here is a link to the live games ( all! ).  I finally found it on http://www.crestbook.com:

http://schachlive.dresden2008.de/live.team.games.f.eng.html

I intend to follow very closely as many games as possible,  paying attention to super-elite GMs and also to our Canadian  team.

Korchnoi plays Black with Svidler, French defense.  I support the old guy, he is 77 and still playing!  I remember breaking news on the Soviet radio about the match in Bagio with Karpov and game scores in the newspapers – big articles if Karpov won the game,  smaller if drew and just score if he lost. 

I look at the position after 14 moves, Korchnoi plays pretty agressively!  GM Svetozar Gligorich said: “No matter who is on the other side of the table, Korchnoi wants to win,  with White, with Black, and as Najdorf would laughingly say, even with green pieces.”

Our women are playing with Cuba, they are outrated on every board, but for now they look OK. Don’t have a possibility to follow the men ( I am not at home 🙂 ) and they are playing with India, so I don’t expect very good result.

After move 21 Korchnoi’s weak pawn e6 is under attack, he advances it right away. I like how he plays,and it’s  against Svidler!. Of course, 30 years ago he would beat not only Svidler, but anybody.

Korchnoi is still fighting, 42 moves, R+B vs. R+B and 5 pawns each.

Our women are doing badly, looks like the result will be 3.5:0.5. Men are 1:1 for now.

Old guy sacrificed a pawn and looks like built a fortress … he drew after 56 moves, incredible!

Women finished, unfortunately exactly as I predicted 0.5:3.5, too bad.  Men lost 1.5:2.5.