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Boris Gelfand vs Ding Liren
FIDE Grand Prix Moscow (2017), Moscow RUS, rd 9, May-21
Catalan Opening: Closed Variation (E01)  ·  0-1

8
7
6
5
4
3
2
a
1
b
c
d
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f
g
h
White to move.
ANALYSIS [x]
0-1

rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1
FEN COPIED

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Kibitzer's Corner
May-21-17  Marmot PFL: Can't figure out what Gelfand had in mind with his 20th and 23rd moves. He is still a great player but at age 48 sometimes erratic.
May-21-17  ChessHigherCat: Maybe he overlooked the possibility of Bc7 which blocks everything. Otherwise the pawn push c7 (threatening Qxa8) followed by Rd8 would have been very strong. As to Gelfland's eraticism at 48, Mae West was still eratic into her 80s!
May-21-17  JPi: <Mamot PFL> You simply have the point. Sure Gelfand is a great player and a great man but at 48 years you can't play all time with the energy of your youth. Especially at the end of such strong tournament.
May-21-17  watwinc: <JPi> “… at 48 years you can’t play all time with the energy of your youth”. Um. Lasker, Botvinnik, Smyslow, Keres, Korchnoi …
May-21-17  Marmot PFL: Those were all-time great players, but they peaked in their 30s and then gradually declined. Korchnoi is very rare in peaking in his mid-40s. Probably because he was still hoping to be WC if he could only overcome Karpov, while others his age had either made it to the top or already given up.

Reshevsky had a similar pattern, trying to get a match with Botvinnik in his 40s and also Karpov, raising his game to catch up to Kasparov (while he never did the two Ks were far above the rest until the Ivanchuk, Anand, Kramnik generation arrived in the 90s).

May-22-17  Caissanist: You wouldn't have had to know much about chess to see the likely result of this game: https://images.chesscomfiles.com/up... .
May-22-17  12Knaves: Wasnt Boris a WC challenger a few years back?
May-22-17  ex0duz: I think Boris has trouble vs Ding lately, he lost 3-1 to Ding in their 4 game match a year or two ago.

Also, it's not just his age that made his play 'erratic'. He's still a great player, it's just that Ding has his number, and he was already in an uncomfortable position when he made all those sacs/exchanges, otherwise he would not of gone for this/these lines willingly.. obviously. So have to give props to Ding for putting Gelfand in such a position for him to go wrong in the first place, and then finishing the game off nicely and winning the tournament with it.

Ding let like 1-2 games go where he could of won in this tourney, so yeah. Him finishing strong like this to take clear first and vs Gelfand who had been undefeated and who had white is no mean feat..

Especially when you consider that Shak had white and didn't take any chances whatsoever, Ding clearly deserves the win here. I don't remember him playing for any draws, which is more than i can say for Mamedyarov.. compare Shak vs Radja to Ding vs Hou.. :P

Jul-02-17  cormier:


click for larger view

Analysis by Houdini 4 dpa 21 done:

1. = (0.00): 20.Be3 Qxb2 21.Qxb2 Bxb2 22.Bxg5 Ba6 23.Rd2 Bg7 24.cxd5 cxd5 25.Bh3 Kf7 26.Bg4 Bf6 27.Bf4 Rac8 28.Rb1 Rc6 29.Be3 Rfc8 30.Kg2 Ke7 31.Bh5 Bc4 32.Bf4 Ba6 33.Be3 Bc4

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