Luke McShane is chess columnist for The Spectator.
Black to play. Puranik–Sjugirov, another spectacular game played at the Aeroflot Open. Puranik was perhaps counting on 1…Rc1 2 Qa3 Bd2 3 Qb2! threatening mate on g7. Sjugirov found a much more powerful move. What was it? Answers to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 10 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. Last week’s solution 1 Re8+!
The science-fiction writer Douglas Adams ridiculed our primitive species for considering digital watches to be ‘a pretty neat idea’. Digital chess clocks really are pretty neat, because they enable modern competitive games to be played with an ‘increment’. For each move played, you earn extra seconds to make the next one, a simple innovation which allows all games to reach a natural conclusion. (By contrast, analogue clocks allot a tranche of thinking time for a series of moves). A lack of increment on the clock occasionally makes for excrement on the board; bashing out 20 moves in five remaining seconds may be physically impossible, but that never stops people trying. Pieces topple like bowling pins and the clock gets thumped like a broken television.
White to play, a variation from McShane–-Kamsky. In the game above, I was hoping to see 31…Qa5, as I had spotted an opportunity to turn the tables completely. What is White’s next move? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 3 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…Rd5! threatens …Qd1 mate and 2 Qxd5 Nf4+ picks up the queen.
Three consecutive losses in a tournament is dryly termed ‘castling queenside’, in reference to the chess notation for that move (0-0-0). Carissa Yip went one worse, starting with four demoralising zeros at the Cairns Cup in St Louis this month. The 16-year-old American was the lowest ranked player in the elite women’s all-play-all tournament, so it wasn’t about to get any easier, and her experienced opponents were surely looking to capitalise. In the fifth round, she bounced back in style with a win over seven-time US women’s champion Irina Krush. ‘Someone told me that I should just fake it till I make it,’ Yip explained after the game. Those were wise words, not just teenage insouciance.
Black to play, Kateryna Lagno–Ju Wenjun, February 2020. Material is approximately balanced, but White’s king is in serious danger. What was Ju’s next move, which prompted immediate resignation? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 25 February 2020 or via email to victoria@spectator.co.uk. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer that is pulled out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Ra5! (idea 1...Nxa5 2 Rc8+). Black tried 1...
The Dutch artist Theo Jansen has a unique speciality. His ‘Strandbeest’ (beach animals) are kinetic sculptures, which he likes to set free upon a windswept beach. Fashioned from plastic tubes, bottles and the like, these imposing skeletons appear to ‘walk’ along the seafront with a gait at once laboured and graceful: a compelling synthesis of engineering and art. When I first watched this magnificent spectacle on YouTube, I was immediately reminded of the cold, gusty walks along the beach at Wijk aan Zee, the town in Holland where the annual Tata Steel tournament is held. (Curiously, Jansen hails from Scheveningen, a seaside resort which lends its name to a variation of the Sicilian defence and to a format of team chess).
White to play, Dubov–Artemiev, Wijk aan Zee 2020. White is pressing here, but Black seems to have everything covered. Which subtle move allowed Dubov to force a quick resignation? Answers to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 18 February 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 49…Bxd1 50 g6! forces a pawn through, e.g. 50…hxg6 51 h7! wins.
We had never met, but David Paravyan, from Russia, has been something of a personal idol since August 2018. My veneration was exclusively based on one game whose dazzling ingenuity was, to my eyes, awesome. Last week he took first place (and a £30,000 prize) at the Gibraltar Masters, one of the most prestigious open tournaments in the world. Paravyan is an accomplished grandmaster, but this was a huge career breakthrough in a field that included the likes of Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Seven players tied for first place on 7½/10, and Paravyan triumphed in a gruelling series of tiebreak games after the final day’s play. Nevertheless, I cannot resist showing the earlier game which so impressed me.
Black to move, Paravyan vs McShane, Isle of Man 2019. Here I intended 49…Bxd1. What had Paravyan planned after that move? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 11 February 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…Rf3+! 2 Kxe4 Rxf7! wins.
Black to move. Javakhishvili–Adams, Gibraltar 2020. Adams has a few plausible moves here, including Rf1, Rf3+ and Rxf7, but only one of them wins. Which is the right one? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 4 February 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 Ng1! keeps everything secure. 1… Bg5 2 exd6 with a decisive advantage.
Looking at the first 12 games of the 2018 Carlsen-Caruana World Championship, which all ended in draws, I saw a statistical blip where others saw an ossified match format and the death of classical chess. But nobody could decry the drama at this year’s Women’s World Championship, in which reigning champion Ju Wenjun from China saw off a fierce challenge from 21-year-old Russian Aleksandra Goryachkina. The early games saw Goryachkina willing to engage in protracted battles, but it was Ju who got the first win from a tricky queen ending in the fourth game. Undeterred, Goryachkina struck back immediately, and went on to take the lead herself in the eighth game. Ju was rewarded for several bold decisions in the ninth, leaving the scores level.
Cars, computers and cadavers: taking them apart is normally reserved for experts and the pathologically curious. In his new book, The Moves that Matter, Jonathan Rowson takes a scalpel to the game of chess itself, and finds abundant meaning in its cultural, psychological and metaphorical aspects. Or as he puts it: ‘Chess is just a game in the way that the heart is just a muscle.’ It’s ambitious stuff, but we’re in good hands. Dr Rowson is a three-time British champion (2004-2006), writer, philosopher and co-founder of Perspectiva, a research institute that examines the relationship between complex global challenges and the inner lives of human beings. The Moves that Matter is unusual in that Rowson has written a chess book with a general audience in mind.
Rowson-Yermolinsky, World Open 2002. This position arose after a tactical skirmish. White has only one good way to meet the threat to the rook, which had to be seen well in advance. What is it? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 28 February 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 Qg8+!
Sanguineti–Najdorf, Mar del Plata 1956. White to move. White played 1 Kd8?, to threaten 2 Qe7#. Black resigned, overlooking 1…Rxg4 to prepare Ke6-f5. White should have chosen a queen check instead. Which one? Answers by Tuesday 21 January to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator or 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 Rxh7+! Kxh7 2 Qh5+ Kg8 3 Ne7 mate.
As backhanded Christmas gifts go, a copy of 12 Rules for Life, must be up there with wrinkle cream or a nose-hair trimmer. One generous soul decided that Jordan Peterson’s bracing self-help book, published two years ago, was just the tonic I need to improve my life and character. Who knows what advice to take, when feedback from the game of life is so wickedly fuzzy? Most decisions are inconsequential, and some which look good will come back to haunt you. But in the game of kings, results are unambiguous: win, lose or draw, and then you get reincarnated. So in the spirit of January resolutions, this is how those dozen rules might apply to chess. 1. Stand up straight with your shoulders back. A good start: sit up straight at the board.
‘Every day is different’, people like to say about their jobs. For the world’s best chess players, that’s only partly true. The game will be different, but the day will look much the same, and so will the international hotel room. In fact, professional players love a routine: they keep their energy for the game, not on deciding where to eat. That monastic focus can’t be taken for granted, especially when you’ve already achieved the highest goals. When Vladimir Kramnik, the former world champion who defeated Garry Kasparov in London in 2000, announced his retirement from chess last year, he put it down to a drop in motivation. The results of his games had stopped mattering quite so much to him.
Carlsen–Nakamura, December 2019. In the decisive playoff game, Carlsen played 1 Nxf7+ and won quickly. But there was a mate in 3 available. What is the first move? Answers should be sent to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 14 January 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…Qd5! (idea Qxg2#) 2 Qxd5 Rxf1+ 3 Kh2 Nxd5 4 Bxd5 d3 wins.
Black to play. Ilfeld & Vachier-Lagrave–Picot & McShane. Pro-Biz Cup, London 2019. My move. White threatens checkmate with Qc4-g8, so I exchanged rooks on f1 to divert the queen. We won in the end, but what would have been a stronger move? Answers to ‘Chess’ at The Spectator by Tuesday 7 January 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 Qe7! threatens mate on h4. 1…Rxg3+ 2 hxg3 g5 3 Qxh7+ Kg4 4 Qh3 mate.
Besides the Grand Chess Tour final, an abundance of chess was played at this year’s London Chess Classic. More than 2,000 children visited the festival, which was organised by the charity Chess in Schools and Communities. Fittingly, two talented youngsters shared first place in the Fide Open event — 14-year-old Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa from India and 18-year-old Anton Smirnov, from Australia. Michael Adams added another title to his collection by winning the British Knockout Championship. He had a close shave in the quarter finals, narrowly surviving an Armageddon game against the promising young player Marcus Harvey, who sailed through a qualifying tournament with 8.5/9 the previous day.
White to play. Aronian–Carlsen, December 2019. Carlsen won the third-place playoff, but Aronian found a nice finish in this game. What move prompted Carlsen’s resignation? We regret that owing to print deadlines this is not a prize competition. Last week’s solution 1…Qa7!! wins, as 2 Bxa7 Rxg2+ 3 Kh1 Rxh2+ 4 Kg1 Rag2 is mate.