After the classical games of the fourth round of the World Chess Cup 2013 have been completed, four players have secured qualification to the quarter-finals.
The remaining four matches were to be decided in rapid/blitz tie-breaks.
Vachier-Lagrave Maxime – Gelfand Boris
In the first game Gelfand started with the Gruenfeld Indian defence and even obtained certain initiative on the dark squares around white king. Vachier-Lagrave defended tenaciously and sought to trade the pieces to ease the pressure.
The queens went off and white snatched a seemingly irrelevant pawn on a7. But after further simplification exactly the passed a-pawn brought the victory to white.
In the return game Gelfand couldn’t do much against the ultra-solid Slav defence and finally a draw was signed on move 72. Vachier-Lagrave is through to the quarter-final.
Andreikin Dmitry – Karjakin Sergey
Andreikin played white in the first game and employed Torre attack to prevent Karjakin’s favourite Nimzo-Indian defence. Black reacted poorly and white launched a strong kingside attack. There was no decent counter-play and Andreikin scored a quick victory to take the lead.
In the second game Andreikin opened with the Classical French. He solved the opening problems and equalized the play. Karjakin desperately pushed in order to even up the score, but it backfired and Andreikin signed another victory to qualify for the next round.
Le Quang Liem – Svidler Peter
Le Quang Liem played a rare line against the Gruenfeld Indian and quickly created problems for the defending World Cup champion Svidler. He opened the position around black’s king and continued to press, but just like in the earlier game with the classical time control, Svidler somehow held and managed to weather the storm. Game drawn by repetition.
In the return match Svidler started with the innocuous Slav Exchange variation. Naturally, the play was roughly equal after the opening, until white imbalanced the position by trading R+P for B+N. Le Quang Liem defended well in the endgame, until white found a way to eliminate the black d5-pawn. After lots of maneuvering white finally forced the opponent to give the rook for the pawn and then duly delivered B+N checkmate. Svidler goes to the quarter-final.
Tomashevsky Evgeny – Morozevich Alexander
The first two rapid games were drawn, but Morozevich definitely missed a huge chance with white pieces where he held the advantage throughout the game.
In the next set of the rapid games, Morozevich repeated the Gruenfeld Indian, but this time Tomashevsky played better and took the upper hand. However, later he dropped most of the advantage and then even blundered to hand the victory to black.
Needing only a draw in the next game, Morozevich played exchange variation in the Caro-Kann. The pawn structure got locked and Tomashevsky shuffled the pieces around trying to find a convenient break.
Black did manage to win a pawn, but he probably missed better continuation in the time trouble and white was able to prolong the fight. However, Morozevich misplayed the queens endgame and lost on move 169.
In the first blitz game Morozevich dropped the exchange variation and went for his pet Caro-Kann Advance. White played aggressively but after the trade of the queens he started to lose the thread. Black went on to win.
For the last blitz game Morozevich went all in and white accepted the challenge without a blink. There was a funny moment in the final position when Tomashevsky decided to force the perpetual check instead of delivering checkmate in one. Tomashevsky is through to the 5th round.
Replay the games with computer analysis
Round 4 tie-break results:
Andreikin Dmitry 2727 – Karjakin Sergey 2776 1-0 1-0
Le Quang Liem 2712 – Svidler Peter 2746 ½-½ 0-1
Tomashevsky Evgeny 2709 – Morozevich Alexander 2736 ½-½ ½-½ 0-1 1-0 1-0 ½-½
Vachier-Lagrave Maxime 2719 – Gelfand Boris 2773 1-0 ½-½
Round 5 pairings:
Tomashevsky Evgeny RUS 2706 – Kamsky Gata USA 2741
Vachier-Lagrave Maxime FRA 2719 – Caruana Fabiano ITA 2796
Kramnik Vladimir RUS 2784 – Korobov Anton UKR 2720
Andreikin Dmitry RUS 2716 – Svidler Peter RUS 2746
Report by Goran Urosevic
