Chess (#1099)

The financial worries about the Olympiad have receded with an infusion of euro 1.5 million equivalent to support the event, which has a total estimated cost of euro 16-17 million. This additional funding was sanctioned and passed with multi-party support in the Norwegian Parliament. A relatively small budgetary gap of about euro 350,000 remains to be plugged.

The ongoing Norway Super Chess at Stavanger is being officially billed as the "No Logo Norway Chess 2014". It is sponsored by the online wager site, Unibet, which has nine million customers in 100-odd countries. Norwegian law doesn't allow "marketing of international online gambling operators" and hence, no logo. Unibet is streaming matches and offering odds, both pre-match and live.

Magnus Carlsen dominated the blitz event which decided pairings, winning with 7.5 from 9. In the classic event, Fabiano Caruana has established a lead with 2.5 from 3. "Fab" started with wins against Alexander Grischuk and Peter Svidler and he had the better of a draw against Carlsen.

Second place is shared by Vladimir Kramnik and Grischuk (both 2). The world champion is on 1.5 and yet to play his first decisive game. Grischuk chucked his game against Caruana with a horrid time trouble blunder. He got a compensating bit of good luck when Levon Aronian forgot opening analysis and dropped his queen on move 14. Caruana's other win came from a deeply analysed piece sacrifice, which successfully bamboozled Svidler.

In the Asian nations cup at Tabriz, (Iran), China took both gold medals with India taking both silvers. In the open section, India beat China. But the Indians were held to two draws in the 10-team event while the Chinese swung eight wins, leading to matchpoint ties. The PRC had more game-points.

In the women's event, the Indians lost a final round match to the PRC.

Meanwhile the auctions for the second season of the Maharashtra Chess League is over. The League is scheduled to be played out over June 11-15 at the Hindu Gymkhana, Pune. The MCL is loosely modelled on the IPL with six city teams fighting it out.

The diagram WHITE TO PLAY (Grischuk Vs Aronian, Norway 2014) has occurred in hundreds of games. White played 12.Bd3 e4 (Very messy complications arise with 12.--f5 13. Nxe5 Nxe5 14. Qe2 Bd6 15. f4 , etc. ) 13.h5 Qf5 ?? Neither player had spent 10 minutes to get here.

Grischuk started thinking here. He may have expected 13.-- Qa6 14. Bxe4 Qxc4 or 14.--h6.

Eventually he played 14.Rh4! exd3 15.Rf4 Nc5 16.Rxf5 Bxf5 17.Nd4 Bd7 and black just doesn't have enough for the queen (1-0, 40 moves).

Devangshu Datta is an internationally rated chess and correspondence chess player