The annual Bosnia GM tournament has had its ups and downs over the year. From an obscure local event up to a supertournament with Kasparov, and back down the slope. It continues its reascent again this year with Morozevich in the field. Last year's exciting field produced a remarkably stodgy event. Nisipeanu, Carlsen, and Malakhov shared first on +2.
At the halfway point of this strong double round-robin in Sarajevo, Sergei Movsesian, representing Slovakia this week, is in the lead by a full point. It's a six-player event with Alexander Morozevich as the top seed by a long mile. Short, Timofeev, I.Sokolov, and local boy Borki Predojevic round out the category 17 (2669) field. The two lowest rated players are in the top two spots. Moro has lost twice and Short thrice, while Predojevic has borked the competition and sits at +1. (The 20-year-old made a solid even score last year.) Movsesian, an Armenian player who represented the Czech Republic for a while before heading for the border a few years ago, is the only player without a defeat so far.
Typically zany is Morozevich's box score: four decisive games, all wins by black! He was holding a difficult position against Movsesian in round four but missed the power of the cute 25..Ng7! and White is defenseless against the knight invasion. Those dastardly backwards moves get you every time. Moro's draw with Predojevic finished with an amusing king waltz before a perpetual check.
The Nige, soon to be confronted with the full-on comfy chair treatment by the FIDE Ethics Committee [sic], hasn't been able to get on track. He did score a nice win with ye olde Evans Gambit against Sokolov. The advancing pawn wall was surprisingly menacing and the final position is witty fun. Games at TWIC.
"Borked the competition"?
Strange coincidence: I am reading a book where to "bork" means to kill someone in a way I won't discuss here.
I also found "to attack (a candidate or public figure) systematically, esp. in the media." (dictionary.com).
I would be grateful for clarification!
Best wishes,
Charley
No such is possible since I just made it up. Sounded like a fun invented verb to me. The dictionary site is taking it from the confirmation hearings of judge Robert Bork, btw. He went through a brutal hazing and was eventually not confirmed. That wasn't on my mind at all. But if you said someone going through a confirmation process was "afraid of being borked" that would ring bells. I remember it being used a few times when Harriet Miers' nomination was shot down in flames in 2005. Forgot about that.
Robert Bork deserved worse than he got, in my opinion. At any rate, it's the last time that the Dems actually did their "advise and consent" job with a GOP Prexy.
Short is showing some rust, but also showing a bit of his style from 15 years. Nakamura could do worse than get some lessons from Short on how to play the Romantic Openings. Even the "B" event is worth perusing.
Predojevic has been playing opportunistically, and his opponents have provided him with opportunities.
If the site is correct, the "live games" listing shows that Moro and Timofeev have agreed to an 8-move draw. I really hope that's an error.
probably morozevich is sick somehow, otherwise I can not understand his performance so far - specially with his 8 (!) move draw today.
With Morozevich you should always expect the unexpected.
Just out of curiosity and off topic for a moment. How does FIDE have the ability to regulate off board behavior of players when the players are not themslves members of FIDE? If this were a tax and I had no representation I be a litte po'd at this.
(sidebar) Mig:
I see that you've used the nickname of "The Nige" for Nigel Short. Over at FICS I use a similar nickname which I, unfortunately, spelled differently as "The Nig".
The result is that I get messages objecting to a racist nickname (fill in the blanks: The Ni**er) that I cannot change. Argg.
Thanks for the explanation, Mig. I was, by the way, confusing "bork" with "burke" (a word I first read in a book about poker, "Positively Fifth Street", which unsurprisingly also includes incorrect facts related to chess).
Funny, but I read bork as in "bork bork bork!!" - Swedish Chef, which doesn't make that much sense...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_Chef
Yah, it was definitely more Swedish Chef than Supreme Court for me, too. There used to be a web translator that could turn every page into Swedish Chef-speak. Ah, here it is:
http://tinyurl.com/2rqxbw
Of course it really has to be read aloud with gusto.