Luke McShane is chess columnist for The Spectator.
White to play and mate in 2. Composed by Bo Lindgren, Probleemblad 1969. Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 28 March. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Bh6+!
Three summers ago, I was invited to the Swedish city of Eskilstuna, for a brief but exciting match against their top player, the affable Nils Grandelius. Earlier this month, Grandelius visited London, this time to play a match against my England team-mate David Howell. The England-Sweden Challenge match was staged as part of the 30th anniversary celebrations of the founding of the London Chess Centre and the relaunch of Chess magazine. It was held in refined surroundings at the residence of Sweden’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, Mikaela Kumlin Granit. Seeing the photos, one yearns to play more chess in rooms with library ladders. The ten-game match saw a striking contrast between Grandelius’s active approach and Howell’s supremely patient brand of chess.
White to play. Rapport-Rogic, Austria 2010. Black threatens Qa1+ and then Rxf2+, so Rapport must strike at once. Which move did he play? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 21 March. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1…Qxc3! Then 2 bxc3 Ba3+ 3 Kb1 Rd1 mate, or 2 Rxc3 Rxg7 and Black should win with the extra bishop.
Richard Rapport took first place at the Fide Grand Prix in Belgrade last weekend. The Hungarian grandmaster is now almost assured of a place in the Candidates tournament in Madrid later this year, which will determine a challenger for the World Championship. Only a very unlikely outcome at the final Grand Prix event (which begins in Berlin next week) would see him knocked out of the cycle. Rapport is popular with fans for his rich imagination and penchant for offbeat openings. In the past, that sometimes made for erratic results, but a newfound consistency has propelled him into the world’s top ten. The diagram position shows the critical moment from the final match. Rapport could repeat moves with 30 Qe3, leading to a draw by repetition in light of the previous moves.
Black to play. Shirov-Kramnik, Groningen 1993. Shirov threatens Rg3-h3+ so Kramnik forced a draw: 1…Rxg7+ 2 Rxg7+ Kh6 3 Rg8 Kh7 etc. Which move would have won Kramnik the game? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 14 March. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address. Last week’s solution 1 Qg8+! Qxg8 2 Rh1# or 1…Kxg8 2 Rxa8+ wins. Other tries lead to stalemate or perpetual check e.g. 1 Qd4 Qd8+ 2 Qxd8 stalemate or 1 Qd1 Qg2+ etc.
I do not, as a rule, go looking for a fight on a Sunday morning. Chess, if it must be played at all, should be approached with due caution. My game plan tends to be pretty simple: deploy the pieces onto sensible squares and hope that the coffee kicks in before anything interesting happens. Usually the opponent observes similar norms. Vincent Keymer, 17, is one of Germany’s brightest talents, and he took me by surprise when we met last weekend in the Bundesliga. The opening moves were familiar, so I was looking forward to some stodgy manoeuvring while digesting my breakfast. But his pawn sacrifice with 14…Nf6 forced me to think. Taking it would grant him a mobile pawn centre and strong pair of bishops, but even on a Sunday morning, declining looked a bit too supine.
White to play and win. A gem discovered by the Ukrainian composer Vladislav Tarasiuk with Israeli composer Amatzia Avni. How does White avoid stalemate and secure the win? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by 7 March or via email to victoria@spectator.co.uk. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1...Rb3! Then 2 Rxa5 Rxb1+ leads to mate, while 2 Qd1 Rxb1 3 Qxb1 Qxf5 leaves Black a rook up.
The Champions League final has been moved from St Petersburg to Paris and the Russian Grand Prix in Sochi cancelled. It was obvious that the Chess Olympiad, to take place in Moscow in July and August, could not continue as planned. Last week, this was confirmed by Fide, the international federation, and it is reported that the Indian federation has put forward a bid worth $10 million to host the event. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has repercussions for chess that go well beyond the Olympiad. Fide Council released a significant statement at the weekend expressing condemnation of Russian military action and resolving to terminate sponsorship agreements with ‘any Belarusian and Russian sanctioned and/or state-controlled companies’.
Black to play. Maric-Gligoric, Belgrade 1962. White has offered to exchange the rooks on f5 and c3. But Gligoric found a much stronger shot, prompting instant resignation. What did he play? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 28 February. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address. Last week’s solution 1…Rxa7+ 2 Rxa7 Rb5+ Capturing the rook leads to stalemate, while otherwise it can check along the b-file forever.
Hikaru Nakamura justified his wildcard invitation by taking first place at the Fide Grand Prix in Berlin this month. The American grandmaster has become the world’s most popular chess streamer, and had not played a slow game in more than two years. But he looked fresh and relaxed, and evidently the steady practice of elite online speed events have kept his skills sharp. Facing a rising Russian star, I suspect Nakamura’s eye was quickly drawn to 29 Qb4, hoping to deflect Black’s queen or win the Bb5. But after 29…Qxb4 30 Rxd8+ Qf8! 31 Rxf8+ Kxf8 the endgame is likely to end in a draw. So you keep the idea, shake things up a bit, and see what drops out: Hikaru Nakamura-Andrey EsipenkoFide Grand Prix, Berlin 2022 (See left diagram) 29 Bxf6!
Black to play. Shuvalova–Pavlidou, Women’s World Blitz Championship, 2021. White was winning, but has just played 89 g3-g4? No resignation here: Pavlidou seized her opportunity to save the game. What did she play? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 21 February. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address. Last week’s solution 1 Rd3+. Then 1…Kc6 2 Nd8# or 1…Kc4 2 Ne5#, or 1…Ke4 2 Nc5#, or 1…Ke6 2 Rd6#.
Contemplating a lost position is a bit like having sauce down your shirt. It is annoying in itself, but worse, it often comes with a sting of embarrassment. We chess players are a proud lot, and losing is an affront to our dignity. And what do your dining companions make of it? You might jokily draw attention to the stain, to pre-empt the suspicion that you hadn’t noticed or didn’t care. It is one thing to be clumsy, but quite another to be thought dopey as well. The chess player wrestles with a similar urge. A true poker-face is a rarity, and I suspect that is because most of us don’t even try. A vigorous shaking of the head, besides expressing genuine despair, is also an oblique way of saving face. It says ‘Touché! Yes, I am undone, but I know it now!
One tradition at the annual Gibraltar Masters is a high-spirited skittles match played in the evening between teams of men and women, dubbed the ‘Battle of the Sexes’. In 2020, to much amusement, the women won a playful miniature after the flamboyant 3…f5 quickly backfired: 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bc4 f5 4 d3 fxe4 5 dxe4 Nf6 6 Ng5 Qe7 7 Bf7+ Kd8 8 Ne6+ Black resigns. This year, Gibraltar hosted a real ‘Battle of the Sexes’ event with a £100,000 prize fund. It featured the unusual Scheveningen format where players in teams (ten women and ten men respectively) faced each member of the opposing team over ten days. The teams (with one reserve on each side) were carefully selected to ensure a balanced match.
White to play and mate in two moves. Composed by Touw Hian Bwee, Schakend Nederland 1976. The first move allows Black’s king to run in any of four directions, with a different mating response to each one. What is it? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 14 February. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address. Last week’s solution 1 Qxa7+ Qxa7 2 Nc7 mate.
White to play. Dardha–Shuvalova, Tata Steel Challengers 2022. The 16-year-old grandmaster from Belgium found a crisp way to finish the game. What did he play? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 7 February. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1…Rh1! 2 Qxh1 Qc3 and Qc3-b2 mate is unstoppable.
World championship match play has a stony logic, where there are no prizes for glorious endeavour. It calls to mind the old joke about two hunters who encounter a bear. One puts on his running shoes. ‘You can’t outrun a bear,’ objects his friend. ‘I don’t have to outrun the bear, I only have to outrun you.’ After beating Ian Nepomniachtchi in December, Magnus Carlsen reflected on his experience of winning five world championship matches. ‘I managed to stay relatively process- and passion-driven against Anand in 2013, while in the last four matches it has been all about results.’ Those months consumed by a single opponent surely take a toll on the psyche.
Black to play. Grandelius–Rapport, Tata Steel Chess 2022. With a bishop resting on a3, the White king can never sit comfortably. Rapport’s next move was a crushing blow. What did he play? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 31 January. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address.
When Magnus Carlsen won last year’s Meltwater Champions Tour, they made two trophies. One was for Carlsen, and the second was auctioned online, fetching a sum in digital currency of around $25,000. The trophy only exists as a video showing a stack of rotating gold squares, like a Donald Trump skyscraper from the future. If you bought it, you’d be right on trend. Earlier in 2021, the winning bid at Christie’s for a digital artwork named ‘Everydays: the First 5000 Days’ came in at $69 million. That was for an elaborate collage created by graphic designer Mike Winkelmann, using the pseudonym ‘Beeple’. The pixels aren’t worth diddly squat, since anyone can download a copy.
Here’s a challenge which appeared in a German chess magazine in 1848: place eight white queens on an empty chessboard so that no two queens occupy the same file, rank or diagonal. In other words, none of the queens may defend each other. Perhaps you start with a queen in the top left corner, on a8. The next might be placed on the adjacent file, nearby but not touching, on the b6 square, a knight’s move away from the first. Following the pattern, you put another on c4, and a fourth one on d2. For the e-file, we need to break the pattern, so let’s revert to near the top of the board, on e7. Flushed with success, you see that the ‘knight move’ pattern still works, and plonk two more queens on f5 and g3.
White to play. Gelfand–Karjakin, Tal Memorial Blitz 2008. Gelfand’s pawn is pinned, and moving the king runs into more checks. But here he missed a surprising shot. What should White play? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 24 January. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Qh6!