14 September 2022

Three Rounds Behind in Russian Superfinals

There are four leaders among women and no changes among men.

Round three games of the Russian Championship Superfinals among men and women finished in Cheboksary. All games have again been drawn in the open section. Artemiev – Esipenko, Dubov – Matlakov, Murzin – Sjugirov, Tomashevsky – Iljiushenok, Rakhmanov – Nesterov, and Chigaev – Najer ended in a draw.

Evgeniy Najer achieved full-fledged play as Black in a long game, seizing initiative and winning a pawn and in the middlegame. A series of appropriate maneouvers and piece rearrangements allowed him to increase his superiority and grab another pawn. However, with little time left after move 40, Black would perform inaccurately by opting for positional simplifications. A drawn ending with the opposite-coloured bishops arose after mass liquidations.

Standings after Round 3:

1. Vladislav Artemiev – 2 points
2-11. Maksim Chigaev, Evgeniy Najer, Maxim Matlakov, Sanan Sjugirov, Ilia Iljiushenok, Andrey Esipenko, Evgeny Tomashevsky, Volodar Murzin, Aleksandr Rakhmanov, Daniil Dubov – 1.5
12. Arseniy Nesterov – 1.

Round 4 pairings:

Iljiushenok – Najer, Matlakov – Chigaev, Nesterov – Dubov, Sjugirov – Rakhmanov, Esipenko – Murzin, Tomashevsky – Artemiev.

In the women's section, a first-timer Ekaterina Goltseva scored her first win by defeating Leya Garifullina as White. The athlete of Nizhny Novgorod said after the game that she had aimed at initiating a complex fight from the very beginning since both of her previous matches had been practically played in the endgame. And Goltseva did manage to put her plan into action: White got a promising position and managed to create problems for her opponent, which Garifullina failed to resolve.

Playing White against Evgenija Ovod, Daria Charochkina found herself in a difficult position against the chess player of St. Petersburg who got the two bishops advantage from the opening and grabbed a pawn in the middlegame. However, Ovod followed by allowing her opponent to muddy the waters and blundered a rook. Despite stubborn resistance, Black threw in the towel on move 38.

The battle of rating-favourites Gunina – Pogonina saw Black get the upper hand. Natalija Pogonina:

– I was worse, but it became more or less acceptable following a number of rearrangements. I'm not confident about soundness of White's pawn sacrifice, but it turned out great with my time pressure looming ahead. It needs double checking, but feelings are such that my position was suspicious at some moment. And then, Valentina apparently overdid it because 38.g5 Rf5 results in her bishop's trapping. However, the game turned out to be sharp and I nearly got into the second time trouble. Fortunately, my position was very robust (laughing).

Olga Girya, who played White against Mariya Yakimova, won an exchange on move 16, but the advantage prosecution stage dragged on somewhat. At some point, when the opponents transposed into an endgame with rooks and minor pieces and an extra pawn for White, it seemed that Black was out of the woods. Nevertheless, Girya succeeded in outplaying her opponent.

Alina Bivol had good chances to defeat Alisa Galliamova as White but committed a slip. Galliamova, in turn, took advantage of the "gift" and found the only way to bail out. The chess player of Kazan made a draw with precise play. Guseva – Zhapova also ended in a draw.

Standings after round 3:

1-4. Marina Guseva, Ekaterina Goltseva, Daria Charochkina, Olga Girya – 2 points
5-9. Alisa Galliamova, Alina Bivol, Leya Garifullina, Natalija Pogonina, Yana Zhapova – 1.5
10-11. Evgenija Ovod, Valentina Gunina – 1
11-12. Mariya Yakimova – 0.5.

Round 4 pairings:

Garifullina – Galliamova, Ovod – Bivol, Yakimova – Charochkina, Guseva – Girya, Pogonina – Zhapova, Goltseva – Gunina.

***

The Russian Championship Superfinals among men and women take place in Cheboksary as part of the Chess in Museums project, jointly organised by the Chess Federation of Russia and the Elena and Gennady Timchenko Foundation. The tournament venue is the Chuvash State Art Museum.

Tournaments are held to a round-robin system in 11 rounds. Game days: September 11-16 and 18-22. Rest day – September 17. Each round begins at 15:00.

The total guaranteed prize fund makes 11 million rubles: 7 million rubles in the open and 4 million in the women's section.

The Superfinals are organised by the Chess Federation of Russia with support of the Russian Ministry of Sport, the Government of the Chuvash Republic, and the Elena and Gennady Timchenko Foundation.

The CFR general partner is PhosAgro. The tournament partners are Aeroflot, Akkond, Gazprombank, and Locko-Bank.

Tournament on Chess-Results (Open)

Tournament on Chess-Results (Women)

Tournament page