CHESS#1309

There will soon be major changes in chess politics. Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, who has served as President of Fide from 1995 onwards, did not file nomination for re-election. There will be three panels at the Batumi elections (Georgia) during the Olympiad (Sep 26-Oct 6).
 
The first panel is led by Georgios Makropoulos, who has been acting president since Ilyumzhinov was placed under US sanctions. The second panel is led by Nigel Short. The third panel is led by Putin's Special Economic Adviser, and sometime Deputy Prime Minister of Russia, Arkady Dvorkovich, who is also a formidable player and organiser. His panel also includes Mahir Mammadov (Azerbaijan), a director of the Azeri SOCAR oil company, and a mover and shaker of the Azeri political establishment.
 
No prizes for guessing who's the favourite.
 

The Makropoulos panel has D V Sundar of India as candidate for General Secretary. Apart from wishing Sundar good luck, Indians will be hoping that an Olympiad team led by Viswanathan Anand improves on the third and fourth places scored at the last two Olympiads.
 
The US team may fancy its chances to defend its title, with Fabiano Caruana, Wesley So, Hikaru Nakamura and Sam Shankland on top boards. Russia and China will be formidable as well. India, Azerbaijan and Ukraine will also be looking at precious metal, and never count out the Armenians.
 
The Russian Higher League in Yaroslavl is a nine-round Swiss to qualify the top five finishers for the Super League. It has seen brutal, high-quality battles. The winner is 31st seed, teenaged GM, Alexey Sarana (6.5/9) who had a better tiebreak than Grigoriy Oparin (also 6.5).

 
The Commonwealth Championships has become a bit of an Indian preserve. It's been held in India quite often and it has been won by Indians many times. This edition in Delhi, saw P Karthikeyan running out champion with 7½ / 9, while Tania Sachdev scored 6.0 / 9 to take the women's title. Vaibhav Suri had the best tiebreak to take second spot in a five-way tie.
 
Anatoly Karpov picked up the 184th tournament win of his career (as far as he could figure out — there might be more!). The 67-year-old legend won his first tournament back in 1961. This was a rapid-blitz mix at the Platja D'Aro (Spain).
 
The diagram, BLACK TO PLAY (White: Alekseenko Vs Black: Sarana, Higher League Russia 2018) illustrates Saran's tactical skills. He played 30.— Nxf2! 31.Rexf2 Bxf2+ 32.Kg2 Nxg4 33.Nxg4 Rae8 34.Qd3. Now, Black to play 34.— Re3!! He had to see this much earlier.

 
Play continued 35.Bxe3 Qf3+ 36.Kh2 Qg3+ 37.Kh1 Qxh3+ 38.Nh2 Qxe3 and (0-1, 57 moves)

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Devangshu Datta is an internationally rated chess and correspondence chess player