What's New- March '02
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Lets start March off with the some Najdorf defense action.
Download PGN of March '02 Open Sicilian games
Najdorf [B90 to B99]
Kriventsov-Wojtkiewicz [B90] sees White's 12 Nb3?! fail miserably. I think White should play Nb3 only when it discombobulates Black's q-side. Here Black's ...Rc8 rendered White's N move useless. Later-on White made matters worse by allowing the stock sac ...Rxc3.
The English GM Michael Adams is great at move-order tricks. Here he gets Kasparov into a Scheveningen-type position, [B80], with Black's pawn on h5 looking a bit misplaced. White had some good alternatives down the road.
I don't understand what happened in Lima-Morovic Fernandez [B99]. How can a strong GM not know that Black had to play 13... Bxg5 instead of 13...Nc5?. The variation has been in the theoretical garbage can for years.
Richter-Rauzer [B60 to B69]
Black continues to suffer in the Rauser. In Cheparinov-Kotronias, [B63], White could have played 16 Nd4! putting Black in the deep water. It's very hard to see improvements for Black.
Sveshnikov/Kalashnikov Variation [B32-B33]
Lets switch to a Sveshnikov variation.
Suprisingly we see the former world champion on the black side. He must have detected a weakness in Shirov's opening repetoire. As we see here Black had a point, shrugging off the dubious piece sac for an easy victory. I've seen Shirov play this piece sac in blindfold chess, but in a regular tournament game it's asking for trouble. See Shirov-Kasparov [B33].
The stubborn Kalashnikov player GM Fedorov bites the dust again, this time to Dominguez in [B32]. The good news for followers of this variation is that Black came out of the opening in one piece.
Paulsen/ Taimanov [B40 to B49]
We end this month's update with a Paulsen/Kan where Epishin's passive play led to an easy win for Svidler [B42].
Hope this update finds all my friends well!
Fed