World Teams 2010: Who's In First?

Yah, yah, so it's technically the 2009 World Team Championship, but it seems a bit silly writing 2009 in the headline when we're eight days into the new year. Three rounds in Turkey have already revealed that there are no big favorites. Remarkably, each of the ten teams has suffered a loss already. A comical six of the ten teams are tied for first with two match wins and a loss. Armenia has the tiebreak lead on board points, if just by half a point. Azerbaijan, after beating arch-rival Armenia, lost to India, which has just lost to the USA. Top seed Russia squeaked by Brazil, then lost to Greece (!) before warming up to take out the US 3-1. Greece's muse left them at the pedestal rather promptly and they lost to underdog Egypt the next day. About the only team really playing to expectations so far is the three losses by the lowly-rated home team. Their pack of 2400s has managed just 2.5 points from 12 games. Hired gun Mikhail Gurevich is still playing for Turkey, isn't he?

The 20 games produced each day is a tidy amount. It's enough to go through them all and guarantee at least few good ones in every round. Grischuk's nicely calculated win over Vescovi in the first round is fun. Not to pick on big rating underdogs, but Sutovsky's win over Ezat was pretty tactics 101. Gashimov-Aronian saw Black ignore the usual 10..h6 to put his bishop on c5, whence it later sacrificed itself on f2 leading to a quick repetition draw. Aronian ignored the fracturing of his kingside pawns and even had the pleasure of playing ..f5 twice in three moves. Anyone figure out why Radjabov didn't take the exchange on move 13 against Akopian? I assume the move order is wrong and White played 13.a3 Na6 then 14.Nd2.

The US beat the hosts 3-1 in the first round with wins from top boards Onischuk and Nakamura. But the game that got all the attention was Can's Greek Gift sac and win against Shulman. Pretty stuff at various points, not just the 18.Bxh7+ cliche. It looks like Black could have bailed out with 21..Nc6, though Shulman was likely looking for more. Still in the first round, Banikas had a half-dozen wins against Gopal but couldn't land the KO. Inserting 29..Bb4! before ..Bb5 would have ended it. Later, in a winning endgame Black spent several moves pushing the white king into perfect defensive position. (60..Rc4+?, 61..Rd4+?) Bizarre. The final touch was putting his bishop in front of his only useful passer.

In the second round, Aronian beat Gelfand in the eternally fertile fields of the Semi-Slav. He got considerable help late in the game when, to all appearances, the World Cup winner hung a piece. It's slightly more likely Gelfand thought his rook and passed b-pawn could hold the balance, but he was quite wrong about that considering the g-pawn-shaped hole in front of his king. Sasikiran came out of the opening in excellent shape against Nakamura's g3 Closed Sicilian. But as so often happens in original and dynamic positions, the top-ranked American held on, kept the pieces on, and steadily outplayed his opponent before pouncing on a winning tactic. The queen rehab sequence 39.Qa7, 40.Qe3, 41.Qf4 is fantastic. Morozevich lost to Papaioannou after he pushed his lack of development too far even for him.

Turkey's young Emre Can, who may be my new favorite player, Couldn't do it with my dear old King's Gambit (!) against Sargissian in the 3rd round. A Muzio Accepted, no less! As usual, however, even at the GM level, White had his chances even after giving up a piece on move 5. A true King's Gambiteer like Spassky understands that it's not how many pieces you have left, it's the activity in the pieces you have. White spent so many tempi avoiding exchanges he lost the initiative completely and resigned on move 21. White is threatening real damage after the mundane 13.exd6 cxd6 14.Nb5. On the next move White is still doing well after 14.Bxh6 Rxh6 and now the oblique but typical 15.Rf1! Get all the pieces into the attack. White can't be down a piece if that rook is still sitting on a8! White threatens the killer 16.Qe3 and solid attempts like 15..Qd7 are met by 16.Bd3 or 16.g4 and f7 is falling. Sigh. We finally get a King's Gambit and it looks like an advertisement for a book on why you should never play it. The Turks' bid for a huge upset went to hell entirely when Esen missed various wins against Pashikian and eventually even lost. The boring 37.Qxc6 protects everything and Black can call it a day. But to give credit, nice shots from Pashikian to turn it around.

Gashimov should have drawn against Sasikiran with his passed a-pawn but missed a cute sequence with a bishop check and could resign immediately. White swapped his bishop on a1 for a rook and then it's easy. Radjabov was about to get the point back against Harikrishna when, very unusually for him, he blew a crushing attack. In a hopeless position by move 17, the Indian suddenly started playing perfect defense and Radjabov let the attack slip away move by move. Ganguly, whose work with Anand seems to have turned him into an impressive late bloomer, took out Guseinov to complete the upset despite Mamedyarov's demolition of Gopal. American champ Nakamura showed he's not afraid to play the Dutch any time, against anyone, and held new Russian champ Grischuk, and then some. Onischuk somehow survived Morozevich's invading forces to draw. But Malakhov destroyed Shulman's French and Akobian seemed to come out of the opening against Vitiugov worse by move eight with the white pieces. The sharp refutation 11..Qxd4! confirmed this impression.

Gelfand played an instructive center demolition against Vescovi, who was probably doing okay had he just captured on d5 on move 16 instead of trying to protect his d-pawn. After 17.f4! Black's position collapses. Sutovsky missed 28..Nxe4 29.Rxe4 Rf1+! winning against Leitao. The live games server at the official site ritually commits whatever the Turkish equivalent of seppuku is, but at least they get the PGN out in decent time. Round 4 today brings the big Azerbaijan-Russia match.