Quality Chess, is sponsoring “Best game of the round” in the Whitsun Grandmasters tournament in Copenhagen. Drop by the website to see live games.
In round one, there were a couple of candidate games (Bech Hansen – Carstensen and Hector – Aabling-Thomsen), but one game was shining just a little bit brighter: GM Rusev – GM Brynell, where Rusev with a beautiful positional exchange sacrifice took control of the game, and after that just outplayed Brynell.
Whitsun Grandmasters 2014, Round 1, 2014.06.03
White: Rusev, Krasimir (2540)
Black: Brynell, Stellan 2463)
Annotator: Schou-Moldt,Thomas
1. Nf3 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. g3 b6 4. Bg2 Bb7 5. O-O Be7 6. b3 O-O 7. Bb2 d5 8. e3
Nbd7 9. Qe2 a5 10. Nc3 a4
11. Nxa4! dxc4 12. Qxc4
With this strong positional exchange sacrifice, Rusev takes full control of the white squares.
12…Ba6 13. Qc2 Bxf1 14. Rxf1 c5 15. Ne5 Rc8?!
Black was better off giving back the exchange immediately. Now the white bishop on g2 becomes a monster and the knights becomes very dominating.
15… Nxe5 16. Bxa8 Qxa8 17. Bxe5 Nd7 18. Ba1 b5 19. Nc3 Ne5=
16. Nc6 Qe8 17. Na7 Rb8 18. Nc6 Rc8 19. Na7 Rb8 20. Nc3! Ne5 21. Ncb5
The white pieces are completely dominating the board.
21…Ng6 22. h4 h5 23. a4 Ng4 24. d4 f5 25. Qc4
The game is now practically over, there are simply too many weaknesses in the black position and the white pieces are working perfectly together.
25…Qf7 26. Nc6 cxd4 27. Nbxd4 N6e5 28. Qxe6 Nxc6 29.Qxf7+ Kxf7 30. Nxc6 Rbc8 31. Bd5+ Ke8 32. Bxg7 Rf7 33. Bd4 Rh7 34. Bxb6 Rh6 35.Nxe7 Kxe7 36. a5 Rc2 37. b4 Nf6 38. Bf3 Ne4 39. Bxe4 fxe4 40. Bd4 Ra2 41. Ra1 Rxa1+ 42. Bxa1 Rc6 43. Bd4 Kd7 44. Kg2 Kc7 45. b5 Rc2 46. a6 1-0
Interesting tournament, someday I should pass by Copenhagen and play there. There seem to be a growing chess scene in Denmark.