Chess News

Malcolm Pein on…Galvanising Magnus Carlsen

Malcolm Pein

February 20, 2021

Malcolm Pein starts his coverage of the Opera Euro Rapid Tournament in today’s Daily Telegraph chess column, explaining how an early defeat only succeeded in galvanising Magnus Carlsen.

Malcolm Pein on…Galvanising Carlsen

Wesley So did his fellow competitors no favours when he defeated Magnus Carlsen in the opening round of the preliminaries of the Opera Rapid on Chess24. The defeat seemed to galvanise Carlsen into action and the world champion won four in a row, defeating Levon Aronian, Matthias Bluebaum, Sam Shankland and Leinier Dominguez to end the day ahead of the 16-player field with So and Ian Nepomniachtchi sharing second place on 3.5/5.

In the previous event, the leading players tried to get to +2 and stay there, which pretty much guarantees safe passage to the eight-player knockout phase. This makes the target score 8.5/15.

Aronian ended the day on 50 per cent, starting with this game in which a rather unsound attack confused Ding Liren, who is playing in the middle of night from China and must be at a considerable disadvantage.

Attacking the Najdorf

L. Aronian – Ding Liren
Sicilian Najdorf/Sozin

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bc4 e6 7.Be3 b5 8.Bb3 Be7 9.a3 (A sideline, hoping to preserve the powerful bishop and preventing b5–b4 undermining e4) 9…0–0 10.h4!? Bb7 11.h5 h6 12.f3 Nc6 13.Qe2 Na5 14.g4 (It turns out that there is no time for 14.Ba2 Rc8 15.0–0–0 Rxc3 16.bxc3 d5!) 14…Rc8 15.g5 hxg5 16.h6!? (Route one it is, if 16.Bxg5 Nxe4! 17.Bxe7 Nxc3) 16…g6 17.h7+ Kh8 (White has no place for his king so he keeps on hacking) 18.Bxe6 fxe6 19.Nxe6 Qd7 20.Nxf8 Bxf8 21.0–0–0 Rxc3!? (21…Nc4 22.Bd4 Bg7 was also good, the h7 pawn covers the black king) 22.bxc3 Qe6 23.Bxg5 Nh5? 24.Rxh5! gxh5 25.e5! (Now the game is unclear because White’s rook will become very active)

25…Kxh7? (A losing blunder. Instead 25…Qa2 threatens Qa1+ and Nc4+ White has to force a draw with 26.Bf6+ Kxh7 27.Qd3+ Kh6 28.Qe3+ Kh7 29.Qd3+) 26.Qd3+ Qg6 27.exd6 Bxd6 (27…Bc6 28.d7 Bxa3+ 29.Kb1 Qxd3 30.Rxd3 Nb7 31.d8Q should be a win) 28.Qxd6 Qxg5+ 29.f4 Qg7 30.Qd3+ Kh6 31.Qd6+ Kh7 32.Qd8 Nc6 33.Qe8 1–0

Test Your Strength

Duda – Ding Liren
White to play and win

Highlight the space below this line to reveal the answer.

47.Qg8+ Kg6 48.Re6+ Kg5 1-0 Re5 follows, winning the queen.

Try Chessable for free

4.9 with 3.65K user reviews

Check them on individual course pages

Malcolm Pein

Malcolm Pein is a British International Master, chess organizer, author and journalist. He was a child prodigy and a former British Junior Champion. He qualified for the International Master title in 1985. Malcolm is a distinguished writer, journalist and editor. He has been a chess correspondent of the Daily Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph for over 30 years, has written numerous chess books and is the Executive Editor of CHESS Magazine. In 1992, he founded the London Chess Centre, a games store in central London and the UK's only chess shop. He is also the founder and CEO of Chess in Schools and Communities, a UK charity whose aim is to introduce chess to state schools and has taught the game to over 250,000 children since its inception in 2009. Malcolm is also well-known for his chess event management. He was responsible for the pre-planning of the World Chess Championship match between Garry Kasparov and Vladimir Kramnik in London 2000. In 2002 he was appointed as Technical Director of the 'Brains in Bahrain' match between Vladimir Kramnik and the computer program Fritz. In 2009, Malcolm devised and organized the 1st London Chess Classic - the UK's first world-class elite all-play-all tournament since the 1980s which ran annually until 2019. Malcolm is also very active with the English Chess Federation. In 2016, he was appointed as the Manager and Captain of the England national team. He was also appointed as English Chess Federation delegate to the European Chess Union and FIDE and is the Director of International Chess. In 2018, he also stood for the post of Deputy President of FIDE. In 2021, Malcolm joined the ranks of Chessable authors by bringing the highlights of his column in the Daily Telegraph in the form of an interactive Chessable course, titled Telegraph Tuesday. Profile photograph © Lennart Ootes