Download PGN of February '10 1 d4 d5 games
The Slow Slav [D12]
Nyback - Giri: Anish Giri came up with a nice, though risky approach. Black not only left his king stuck in the center but even moved it forward, stopping White's d-pawn and using it as the main supporter of his strong knight on e5!
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The position remained rather unclear but Black's solid positional grounding eventually prevailed, leading to a crushing attack against his opponent's king.
Vienna Variation [D39]
Lysyj - Wojtaszek: Radoslav Wojtaszek chose a rare option, but one which is recently becoming a popular antidote to White's old main line. Black solved his problems quite comfortably and it seems that White will have to work hard if he really wants to fight for an advantage in this line.
Moscow Variation [D43]
Anand - Leko: Vishy Anand came up with a surprising knight sacrifice in a long theoretical line:
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22 Nxd4!?, and won comfortably even though Peter Leko didn't make any visible mistake! However, more precise analysis would prove that Black's response to White's novelty was not precise....
Hoffmann - Sandipan: Sandipan Chanda came well prepared in a theoretical line, improving on Black's play in the previous game. As a result he faced no real problems but it seems that White still keeps chances to maintain some pressure.
Korobov - Gasanov: Anton Korobov introduced a very interesting approach to a position where Black was doing very well recently, 16 Bf3!?:
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Botvinnik Variation [D44]
Carlsen - Smeets: Magnus Carlsen surprisingly chose a move which never seemed to be harmful to Black in a long theoretical line, 20 Nb6+:
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I don't believe this game can change the overall assessment, but Black should certainly be more precise in his play since his king is always more vulnerable.
Kasimdzhanov - Shirov: Rustam Kasimdzhanov came up with new and well prepared approach here and gave serious problems to the main Botvinnik expert. In fact Alexey's first reaction was probably not the best but then he fought very well, as usual, trying to make things crazy. Yet it should still not bring him any points, but Rustam, playing a wonderful game, spoiled his win with some inaccuracies and in the end even forgot about the clocks...
Anti-Meran [D45]
Riazantsev - Vitiugov: Alexander Riazantsev cleverly outplayed his opponent with a seemingly unambitious, but actually rather poisonous, approach, which was successfully employed by Max Euwe in his World Title Match against Alexander Alekhine in 1935:
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See you next month, Ruslan
If you have any questions, then please post a message at the 1 d4 d5 Forum, or subscribers can email me at ruslan@chesspublishing.com.