Chessable Houska's Caro

Tashkent FIDE Grand Prix 2014 (2)

Vachier-Lagrave races to 2/2 in the Tashkent Grand Prix

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave won his second game in a row, against Rustam Kasimdzhanov. Photo © Anastasiya Karlovich.

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave won his second game in a row, against Rustam Kasimdzhanov. Photo © Anastasiya Karlovich. |

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave scored his second consecutive win in the Tashkent Grand Prix to lead alone on 2/2. He beat Rustam Kasimdzhanov on the white side of a Berlin Defence with 4.d3. Vachier-Lagrave had a nice edge from the opening and put the pressure on, It does seems there was one possibility of escape for black with 20...Rxd3 with a minimal disadvantage but after 20...Nb3 Kasimdzhanov was just a pawn down for no compensation.

Baadur Jobava is one of the most exciting players in the world to watch but his high risk style runs a lot of risks in a field as strong as this. Today it looked like Fabiano Caruana would take his 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Be2!?! apart. Caruana won Jobava's Queen for Rook and Minor piece but maybe he could have done even better with 11...Ne7. Caruana found ways to make life extremely difficult but after 44...Ra8 (44...Rh1!?) the game was just equal and soon drawn.

Anish Giri looked to have a large advantage against a quick playing Shakhriyar Mamedyarov in a Semi-Slav but it wasn't all that easy in reality and may have been preparation. Stockfish wants to play 29.Kd4 which may lead to a white advantage after major complications but that wasn't easy. In the end the players drew by repetition.

Boris Gelfand had a comfortable but small edge in a Queen's Indian against Sergey Karjakin but as played it was never more than that and the game was drawn on move 40.

Dmitry Jakovenko got a nice endgame pull to torture Teimour Radjabov with in an English but couldn't quite build it into a win.

The first game to finish was that between Hikaru Nakamura and Dmitry Andreikin. It may be Andreikin was better prepared because after his 18...Kf7 novelty (Fressinet won with 18...c4+ against a weaker opponent) the players repeated to draw.

Round 2 Standings: 1 Vachier-Lagrave 2pts 2-3 Nakamura, Andreikin 1.5pts 4-8 Karjakin, Gelfand, Radjabov, Giri, Jakovenko 1pt 9-12 Mamedyarov, Kasimdzhanov, Caruana, Jobava 0.5pts

Round 3 Thursday 23rd Oct 2014 10am BST: Mamedyarov-Gelfand, Nakamura-Giri, Caruana-Andreikin, Kasimdzhanov-Jobava, Radjabov-Vachier-Lagrave, Karjakin-Jakovenko.

Tashkent FIDE GP Tashkent UZB (UZB), 20 x-3 xi 2014 cat. XXI (2753)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2
1. Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime g FRA 2757 * . . . . . . . . 1 1 . 2
2. Nakamura, Hikaru g USA 2764 . * ½ . . . . . . . . 1 2912
3. Andreikin, Dmitry g RUS 2722 . ½ * . . . . . 1 . . . 2957
4. Karjakin, Sergey g RUS 2767 . . . * ½ ½ . . . . . . 1 2737
5. Gelfand, Boris g ISR 2748 . . . ½ * . ½ . . . . . 1 2767
6. Radjabov, Teimour g AZE 2726 . . . ½ . * . ½ . . . . 1 2757
7. Giri, Anish g NED 2768 . . . . ½ . * . ½ . . . 1 2756
8. Jakovenko, Dmitry g RUS 2747 . . . . . ½ . * . ½ . . 1 2716
9. Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar g AZE 2764 . . 0 . . . ½ . * . . . ½ 2552
10. Kasimdzhanov, Rustam g UZB 2706 0 . . . . . . ½ . * . . ½ 2559
11. Caruana, Fabiano g ITA 2844 0 . . . . . . . . . * ½ ½ 2544
12. Jobava, Baadur g GEO 2717 . 0 . . . . . . . . ½ * ½ 2611
Round 2 (October 22, 2014)
Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime - Kasimdzhanov, Rustam 1-0 36 C65 Ruy Lopez Berlin
Andreikin, Dmitry - Nakamura, Hikaru ½-½ 24 C78 Ruy Lopez Moeller Defence
Gelfand, Boris - Karjakin, Sergey ½-½ 41 E15 Queens Indian
Giri, Anish - Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar ½-½ 36 D45 Anti-Meran Variations
Jakovenko, Dmitry - Radjabov, Teimour ½-½ 50 A35 English Symmetrical
Jobava, Baadur - Caruana, Fabiano ½-½ 59 C44 Scotch Gambit

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