NSW Australia Weekender

Here are the two games by young Jasper Hong as promised:




[note: I will post Jasper's annotations to the game later tonight.]

Queenstown Classic/Australia Day Weekender

Queenstown Chess Classic

What is left to say except congratulations to ACT junior Andrew Brown for a fantastic performance at the Queenstown Chess Classic (6.5/10, joint 12th-24th and highest placed junior) AND, lest we forget, the IM norm!!! Other juniors who finished with the same score were Junta Ikeda, Dusan Stojic and Max Illingworth but all three missed out on the IM norm. I will continue to post games from Queenstown when I have a chance to "annofritz" them.

NSW Australia Day weekender

I was busy over the weekend accompanying my son to the NSW Australia Day weekender at Norths Leagues Club (North Sydney). Boy, am I glad we were indoors in an air-conditioned room on Sat when I was reliably informed that the outside temperature reached 44 deg Celcius. Even then, we were doubly lucky since the playing room at the Club had two split air-cond systems which kept the room relatively cool. The rest of the club was a sauna. Sunday turned out to be cooler.

There was a good turnout (69 entries, compared with other Australia Day Weekenders (MCC: 12 entries; Launceston: 20)) and quite a few juniors entered: Gene Nakauchi (all the way from Queensland), Joseph Nguyen (on one of his rare forays into tournament chess), Jack and Harry Ruan, Oscar Wang, John Papantoniou, Sean Gu, Kevin Tan, Nicholas Deen-Cowell, Anton Smirnov, Peter Yang, Jerry Xu, Ethan Derwent (from the ACT), Vincent Chen, Dylan Siow-Lee, Jasper Hong, Alexander Su and Joshua Behar (a new junior player in Sydney/NSW, the family has just moved to Sydney from the USA two months ago). Harry Ruan posted the best junior result with 4.5/7 and sharing in the U1800-U1600 prize.

Some highlights. Sensationally, young Jasper Hong (538) beat Herman Rachmadi (1653)in R1. Herman, inexplicably, dropped a Queen from the opening and Jasper kept his cool to convert into a win. I am trying to get the game in order post later. Herman went on to lose to Ethan Derwent in R3 and to Jerry Xu in R5. This may explain why he did not play his last round game. In R4, in a battle of the youngest juniors, Jasper Hong prevailed over Anton Smirnov. Anton did not have a good tournament, losing also to Ethan Derwent in R2. I saw Anton's father, Vladimir Smirnov, analysing Ethan's R1 loss to Mossaddeque Ali. Hmmmmm! perhaps that extra bit of coaching tip the balance in the game with Anton? On Anton's part, perhaps the euphoria of winning (jointly) the Norths U1600 title has not faded and there was some difficulty concentrating? Sean Gu, the recently crowned Australian U12 champion, played his "coach" George Xie in R1. Hmmmmmm! Shouldn't the coach at least draw? Just kidding! Showing no mercy, George beat his young charge.

In R4, my son played Black against his clubmate, Vincent Chen. Vincent played a c3-Anti-Sicilian but decided that he will use the Queen to take on d4. His words to my son: "let's try this". Perhaps he regretted it as my son went on to win on time (and in a better position). Somehow I think that a serious tournament (where the entry fee is no small sum and prize money is quite good with serious time control) is not the time to experiment with new lines? Unless of course, the words were said as a psychological weapon? Probably not.

Also in R4, Kevin Tan lost to fellow junior Jerry Xu against the grain and I felt that this contributed hugely to Jerry sharing part of the prize money for best U1400. On the whole, Kevin did not have a good tournament. Peter Yang scored an upset in R1 defeating Sarwat Rewais (1817) but could not maintain the pace in later rounds to end on 50%. This was enough for him to share the 3rd prize for U1400 with fellow junior Nicholas Deen-Cowell. John Papantoniou (1621) can be satisfied in having drew with Adrain Chek (2003), beating Zeljko Kanostrevac (1789) and Mustafa Erkan (1813). However, he could not maintained the form against Angelito Camer (1960) and Jason Chan (1962). John told me he was very happy with his win over Zeljko:


I thought I will also post the following game between Sean Gu and Peter Yang, where both players had winning chances in the endgame. Peter Yang missed 52...Rg6 and two possible lines are: 52... Rg6 53. c6 (53. Kf1 f3 54. c6 e3 55. Rc5+ Kd6 56. Rxe3 Rxc5 57. c7 Kd7 58. Re7+ Kxe7 59. b7 Rc1+ 60. Kf2 Rc2+ 61. Kxf3 Rf6+ 62. Ke4 Re6+) 53... e3+ 54. Kf1 f3 55. Rc5+ Kd6 56. Rxe3 Rxc5 57. c7 Kd7 58. Re7+ Kxe7 59. b7 Rxc7.


Finally, my most memorable moment(s) of the tournament has to do with an adult player who I thought played with and embodied the spirit of chess. Looking at him, you wouldn't have believed it but scruffy-looking, Shane Dibley behaved liked a gentleman knight. Down a knight R5 when he blundered not far out of the opening, he resigned against my son. Proving that this was no anomaly, when he was also in a losing position against junior Nicholas Deen-Cowell, he resigned instead of forcing Nicholas to play for the win. In fact he told Nicholas that he was lost when he resigned. Too many times, I have seen adults "forcing" juniors to play for the win. Admittedly, perhaps Shane was overgenerous with his resignation in his game with my son, but you be the judge:


What do you think? In general, do you think stronger players should resigned when they dropped a piece or should they fight on? Should they resigned when there is a mate albeit some many moves away or should they play on hoping the junior will blunder (when there is a strong possibility they might)?

Queenstown Chess Classic Round 7

LATEST!!! LATEST!!! LATEST!!!

ACT junior Andrew Brown continues his remarkable winning streak, creating havoc amongst the 2200-2300s at the Queenstown Classic. Here is his latest conquest. According to TCG who heard it from IA Dr Charles Zworestine and subject to confirmation, Andrew may be headed for an IM norm!


Here is a very impressive game from Dusan Stojic with two sac's in the opening (which according to TCG is theory (up until Black's 19th move)) but unfortunately he lost:

Queenstown Chess Classic Round 4

I will only AnnoFritz two games today. Otherwise there is too much work, too many late nights and my senses start weakening. In addition, I have to take my son to the NSWJCL 3-Day tournament starting tomorrow/today. In previous post, I discussed Schon-Illingworth game and commented that Max missed 44...Nc3+ at the end. After a prompt by a reader, I re-check Fritz 8's analysis and I think I was too optimistic. Eugene's bishop had enough tempi to get to K-side after gobbling up the a-pawn to blockade the g4-square and prevent Black's g-pawn from promoting. *sigh* so much for my "patzer" analysis. But there is no escape in the Round 4 derby between Mighty Max and ACT junior Andrew Brown. In a Modern Defence Averbakh Var, both sides were roughly equal. At least until Andrew's 35th Qe5+. Max moved his king to g2 but Fritz 8 suggested h1. Then Andrew took pawn on c5 (36 bxc5). Here Max had a choice. Retake or something else. He chose something else, 36...Rc1. The consequences of this is the creation of a very weak and dangerous Q-side with 3 Black passed pawns. If we fast-forward to the end, it is these (two out the three) passed pawns that caused enormous problems for Max.


Second game is SA junior Fedja Zulfic's (1956) upset win over Karolina Smokina (2251). In R1, Smokina lost to Sheraqb Guo-Yuthok. From the opening, Fedja slowly gained an advantage; Fritz 8 reckoned 16...h5 is crucial weakening of position. At move 26, Fedja missed a nice little combination: Fritz 8: 26. Ng6+ fxg6 27. Rc8+ Kg7 28. Be5+ Bf6 29. Bxf6+ Kxf6 30. Rxh8 Nxd4 31. Ra8 Kf5 32. Rxa6 g4 33. hxg4+ Kxg4 34. Rd6. Black's last chance at stopping the rot (ie White's passed a-pawn) was 29...a5 but no ... after that it was all desperation for Black.


Here are the other games (please post if you have any comments on the games):

Queenstown Chess Classic Round 3

Just catching up on games involving juniors from earlier rounds. Mighty Max met Eugene Schon again in R3 and again it was a draw. It pays for juniors to replay the game since Max adopts an unusual move order to transpose into a Caro-Kann Advance Var. Perhaps, according to Fritz 8, White's 26th move Nxb7 gave asmall edge to Black. Max slowly increased the advantage although e4 should have been played earlier. However, 33...g5 gave away much of that advantage. Fritz 8 prefers 33...Re6 or 33...Rd8. Max again missed 44...Nc3+ and it is Silman's "fox in a chicken coop" when Black will queen either a or g-pawns. Time trouble?


Andrew Brown could not maintain his winning streak and lost to Brasilian IM Herman van Riemsdijk. A quick run through Fritz 8 suggests that Black may have missed 23...Qb2 leading to exchange of Queens and a passed a-pawn for Black. The text move was more spectacular, exchanging the Queen for 2 Rooks. 31 Bxd5 was bad for White and at the end of the day, 2 Rooks are better than a Queen.


Svetozar Stojic (1972) unfortunately could not create an upset by defeating Tim Reilly (2256). Black played the Rat (Modern Defence) the Classical Var featuring the a6(Tiger's Modern?) but Svetozar played 5 Bc4 instead of 5 Be2. 5 Bc4 is not a popular move and when played by GMs, was only successful in John Emms vs Neil McDonald, 4NCL 1999 and Larry Christiansen vs Alek Wohl, Bled Olympics 2002. Of course Svetozar himself played 5 Bc4 previously against Deni Bourmistrov at the 2003 Australian Juniors in Adelaide (and lost). Perhaps 9 e5 wasn't advisable but 15 Ra2 definitely handed Black the advantage. And 17 Bb5+ handed Black the bishop on a platter. I am bit puzzled why White resigned (or lost on time?) when the position was still playable though Black certainly had a winning advantage.


Junta Ikeda, Dusan Stojic and SA junior Fedja Zulfic had no difficulties scoring wins against opponents rated below them. Junta cleverly provoked a h3 from Holland by advancing his g and h-pawns (at the risk of weakening his own K-side), thus creating a hole at g3. Black's knight to h5 and then to g3 forking King and Rook. White's 23 Bd4 was bad because it overworked the Knight at e2. Simple, yeh!? 30 Nc4 is better than White's 30 Re1 and Junta missed 31 Bxe2. 34 Bd4 allowed the Q-swap to Black's further advantage. Even then, 35 Nc4 is better, better than allowing Black's Rook to 2nd rank. Fritz suggests 36...Bf6. At the end it was mate in 4 or lose the remaining rook.


In an Accelerated Dragon, Dusan missed 20 Bf2 with the idea of Nxe6 and Qxe6 (bishop having moved out of the way for Queen) but he certainly did not miss the Q-side pawn storm. Very nicely done. Black would have been less worse off with 27...Nxc4 instead of 27...Rxc4. Fritz suggests after this that Black should try to stop the Q-side pawns with ...Rb4 instead of launching K-side attack. 31 a7 is an alternative to 31 gxf4.


Fedja was worse in the middlegame until Goldsmith played 29 Re1. Fedja missed 35...Ng6, game was equal, and it became a race to the promotion square. But White went after the Knight with 39 Rd2? instead of 39 Re3 (sacrificing rook for promoted Queen) and White cannot stop the f-, g-, h-pawns. Amusingly, Fritz 8 gives a drawing line for White: 33 dxc6 and Black has a perpetual chekc on King.


Rebecca Harris survivied the famous Trompowski Attack, an exchange of Queens to end up with the bishop pair in the midgdlegame. Further exchanges in equal position saw both sides with a passed pawn each. 28...f6? was dubious and White has a winning advantage. But result shows 0-1 in favour of Rebecca. Brockman lost on time? [edited 20th Jan 2009 1:35 pm: Matt M [in ClosetGM blog where I queried this] pointed out that tournament cross-table showed this as win for White.]


Justin Tan (1870) defeated Kiwi Daniel Baider (2125 (junior??)). Daniel maintained a slight edge into middlegame until Justin's spectacular 18 Qxa7. Daniel's reply 18...b6 should be winning but missed 19...Rd4 and 21...Rxg3. 21...Qh6 passed the advantage to White. Then 24...Bd5? was bad (should have been 24...Ke8); 25...Kc8 was mate in 6 whilst 25...Ke7 Black survives a little bit longer.


Sarah Anton (1682) upset English Meri Grigoryan-Lyell (2092). Black started out very aggressively but its King was caught in the middle. Sarah obtained an advantage when Black played 22...Rc8 but missed 28 Rxf4 to sustain the advantage. 30...Bxb5 was another inaccurate move and 33...Nb3 (moving knight into a pin) did not help either but Sarah missed 35 Bc4. However, she ended up with K+2B+p vs K+R. The game is instructive in how to use the Bishop pair and King to usher the pawn to the promotion square (with slight hiccup at the end). But compare with Hou YiFan-Sasikiran Corus 2009 R2 (below) and Hou's more polished technique.




Sherab Guo-Yuthok (1913) continued his winning ways defeating Martin Post (2094). In a Bishop's Opening, Sherab played good moves, slowly building a slight advantage but missed punishing a slight inaccuracy by White at move 15 Rfe1. Fritz liked 15...d4 with a Queen sacrifice. White sacrifice a rook and then 22 g4? was a miscalculation? Black ended up Q+2B vs R+B+2N. Then it was a straightforward win.


And finally, here is young 12 year old Laurence Matheson (1943) creating his own upset by drawing with Eddie Levi (2219). Laurence was 2008 Australian U12 champion.


To show some cross-Tasman solidarity, I note the upset scored by young Alan Ansell (1300) who defeated the visiting Dane Henrik Mortensen (2022). Alan is only 11 years old. He did well defending against a K-side attack at move 18 (but Mortensen misplayed the K-side attack); launched a spectacular attack with Qxg2 sac'ing the Q for R+2 pawns ending slightly worse off(+/-) (Fritz 8 says Rfe8 is actually =/+). Mortensen missed 25 Qxh6!. Faced with 2 Rs+N vs Q+R endgame, Alan did well, eg, finding 29...Nd5, reducing Mortensen's advantage. Mortensen's 31 Rg6?? was bad allowing Alan's 31...Rf1+, which immediately granted Black a -+ advantage! Then, on move 34, Mortensen blundered with Rd6?. Alan did not make any mistake with the golden opportunity and when faced either mate in two or sacrifice the Q, Motensen resigned. (Fritz suggested 34 Rxc6 which when played out would allow the King escape to b5 from the mating net.) Is time trouble the cause of the blunders?

Queenstown Chess Classic

It is Round 5 at the Queenstown Chess Classic and there are more upset wins by juniors expecially ACT juniors such as Andrew Brown. After prevailing over Mighty Max (Illingworth) in the battle of juniors, he has now defeated Kiwi Nicolas Croad (2305). Here is the game (from pgn entered by ClosetGM):

The Amazing Hou Yifan at Corus 2009/Queenstown Chess Classic

I am glad I am on holidays what with all the chess online ...... there is the Queenstown Chess Classic beginning at 1 pm AEST and the Corus at 11 pm AEST. Aaahhhhh! such is life ...... but chores are piling up .......

Speaking of Corus 2009, I was following this amazing game between Hou Yifan and former world champion, Rustam Kazimdzhanov. Hou playing white opted for the Ruy Lopez and Kazimdzhanov went for the very sharp Closed Ruy Lopez Zaitzev Var. I quickly went for my Johnsen and Johannessen book, The Ruy Lopez: A Guide for Black and located the specific line they were playing. I was amazed that Hou and Kazimdzhanov were following the Anand-Timoshchenko, Frunze 1987 game up to move 34 Qc4 (in YiFan-Kazimdzhanov it is move 37 Qc4). 34 moves of theory!!! and this wasn't even the main-main line of the Var. Check it all out in the Johnsen and Johannessen book pp 87-89.




I wonder if experience does count since the young Anand (b 1969) lost to older Timoshcenko (b 1949) and young Hou (b1994) lost to Kazimdzhanov (b1979).

I would be remiss in my duties if I do not point out that the GM author of the above opening repertoire book on the Zaitzev is playing on the Queenstown Chess Classic. It would be good if someone can get his reaction or comment on the game.

Now onto Queenstown Chess Classic and here are the junior games which I can download from the tournament site:

2009 Queenstown Chess Classic

A quick note to inform that the 2009 Queenstown Chess Classic has begun this afternoon and already there has been an upset of sorts by Australian junior, Emma Guo (1778), who drew with Peter Hohler (2214) (result from Closet Grandmaster live blog at http://closetgrandmaster.blogspot.com/2009/01/live-blog-queenstown-round-1.html). Other juniors who won are Eugene Schon and Junta Ikeda (but both played against lower rated opponents). Latest from Closet GM, another upset win for ACT junior:


[Saturday, 17th January 2009 5:02 pm]
Posting the big upset of R1, Andrew Brown (1987) vs GM Darryl Johansen (2455):


Will post again later with games when available from official site which is a bit slow with the game coding. They seem to be only focusing on the top 11 boards which may mean that some junior games may missed out.

Query: If chess is meant to be more professional and Queenstown Classic has this huge prize money, why can't they spend some money hirinh students to code games? The code of volunteerism in chess can only go so far!

What is Optimal Prep for Juniors? Hot-housing?

Well, as stated in previous post, the Aus Juniors is over for the year and may I say, barely over(!!!) when the adults have began squabbling over the post-mortem. You can read the various statements at http://www.chesschat.org/showthread.php?t=7760&page=15 (actually I would classify this as PG13/M15!).

Without entering the vitriolic backstabbing "discussion", I would like to offer some observations without making any conclusions, leaving it to you, dear readers, to come into your own.

A very pertinent observation is the success of older Victorian juniors (eg, Cedric Antolis) (hrrrmphhh! pat on my back for my prediction a few posts back!). Couple this with success of Eugene Schon at the Australian Open and what do you get? All I wish to point out is that both Eugene and Cedric participated in two very strong tournaments during the pre-Christmas and Christmas-New Year period and did very well. Now, this can mean two things: either they will have extensive match preparation and therefore are match fit, or there is the danger of chess burnt-out. My opinion is the former. So does this mean that other states should organise strong preparatory tournaments for their juniors prior to the Australian Juniors? A parent the Aus Juniors commented that WA Yita Choong was playing below form and that this may be due to lack of tournament play in WA prior to the Aus Juniors. Perhaps further proof of either proposition may be established by Eugene Schon's coming performance in the Queenstown Classic. Food for thought ......

It looks like Queensland (5/10 top ten placings!!!) and NSW (2/10) are dominating the U12 but the two courageous NSW U18 representatives were never in serious contention. Of course, it must be said that stronger older NSW juniors did not participate but the fact does point to a certain lack of depth at U18 level. Now the question for NSW junior chess: How to shepherd the U12 talents through the teenage age years and high school, so that NSW will have strong reps in the U18 in a few years time? Comments are welcomed.

Again, in the Girls events, the same NSW story is repeated with NSW girls dominating the U12 comp whilst there wasn't even one NSW rep in the U18 comp.

My AUD 2 cents worth: NSW junior chess must look to Aus Junior as the culmination of a year-long preparation. This means that NOW(!) is the time to start looking to Aus Juniors 2010. NOW is the time to prepare a programme for promising and dedicated juniors with the aim to competing in the Aus Juniors 2010. Is this hot-housing? This ugly word has already been raised (see ChessChat link above). I don't believe so. A programme will only work if it is a good programme and if the juniors are genuinely interested, in fact, passionate, about chess. Adults including parents can only be facilitators.

Australian Juniors 2009 Adelaide

Well, the biggie junior event of the year is over and we have the new Australian junior and age-group champions for 2009. I thought I should wrap this up before focusing on the Queenstown Classic where a number of Aus Juniors are playing.

Th prizewinners, in case you didn't know, are:
U18 Open Cedric Antolis VIC
U16 Open Yi Yuan ACT
U14 Open Gene Nakauchi QLD
U12 Open Sean Gu NSW
U10 Open Callum Gray QLD
U 8 Open Ethan Lim VIC
U18 Girls Sally Yu VIC
U16 Girls Sophie Eustace SA
U14 Girls Natasha Bortsova SA
U12 Girls Caroline Shan NSW
U12 Girls Denise Lim VIC
U 8 Girls Grace Shan NSW

Congrats to all, especially those facing last round must-win games which I understand from a parent was played under very trying circumstances (construction-work noise and basketball buzzer going off at regular intervals). To recap, U18 Open, U12 Open and U12 Girls were undecided going into the last round. In fact, both Cedric Antolis and Yuan Yi won their games and had to meet in a play-off which Cedric duly won 1.5-0.5. Here are their final round games against no easy opponents:




Sally Yu was already assured of the title going into the last round but in the U12 Girls, the two leaders, Caroline Shan and Joanne Mason, agreed to a draw and had to meet in a play-off. Although the score was not reported, it is obvious Caroline won making it a double with her younger sister, Grace, winning the U8 Girls title.

Sean Gu managed to beat his last round opponent to clinch the U12 Open title despite a pawn down (both sides had two passed pawns). His opponent fell for a nice tactical trick at the end. See for yourself:

Australian Open/Norths U1600/Australian Juniors

Today at roughly 2:30 pm, all was over. We had our winners of the 2009 Australian Open. As "someone" important said, IM George Xie came from nowhere, after suffering two shock defeats to Blair Mandla and Eugene Schon but recovering to string together five consecutive wins, to tie first (9/11) with IM Alek Wohl. I think this is a lesson for juniors: to be able to recover from defeats and win the next game and the next and the next ... Alek in his acceptance speech commented he was pleasantly surprised at the many juniors who played and how well they played. Tongue in cheek, he went on to say that none has yet been able to defeat him.

Victorian junior Eugene Schon was certainly the surprise of the tournament, finishing joint 3rd-5th (8/11) with IM Mark Chapman and Jason Hu. Overhead the "someone" important saying to Eugene's last round opponent: "Do not underestimate him. A few people have done so and have suffered defeats." Well, Eugene won his last round with white in the very topical Breyer variation of the Ruy Lopez. Eugene chose the Ruy and it was interesting observing Black taking more than 5minutes to decide which variation of Ruy to play as Black, alas to no avail. However, not everything went Eugene's way since he missed out on a p[ossible IM norm. It seems his opponents ratings were just not high enough. Damn shame! An IM norm would have surely cap a fine performance.

Another surprise from nowhere was yet another Victorian junior, Dusan Stojic, who played FM Vladimir Smirnov on Board 3, finishing on a high. The Modern Benoni game went right to the brink with Black teetering on the cusp of victory. Alas it was not to be, Caissa (I prefer Diana) chose not to dispense her favour. Stojic, in time trouble, could not find a way to escape from Smirnov's perpetual check and promote his d-pawn. Stojic tied 6th-9th (7.5/11) with Smirnov, Mandla and English FM Mark Lyell.

NSW junior Max Illingworth finished joint 10th-17th. He mentioned that this was a good warm-up tournament for his next, the Queenstown Classic. He is heading off to New Zealand on Tuesday with lots of preparation. Watch out Queenstown! NSW junior, Harry Ruan, shared in the U1700 prize. Victorian junior, Luthien Russell, and ACT junior, Emma Guo, shared the Best Women prize. Another NSW junior, Kevin Tan's last round game against fellow NSW junior Alex Papp won the brilliancy prize. Juniors should take note of what not to do in a Dragon game and should pay attention to the K-side attack. Kevin followed the immortal words of Fischer to the letter, "sac, sac, and mate!". It seems the use of the bishop in moving to h8 (move 23) was considered by the judge, NSW Champion Greg Canfell, to be "brilliant". (I myself nominated Xie-Wohl's epic in R9.) Here is the game:


In the Norths U1600, it was Smirnov junior and Victorian Calvin Bennett, who won their games to come joint first. NSW junior Shi Dawen had the opportunity but could not clear the final round hurdle of Philip Patterson, to join them. Dawen and Philip was joint 3rd-4th. Under-rated NSW junior Jerry Xu took out the U1400 prize.

And, you may ask, how did my son do in his first adult 90+30 tournament? He was very happy to draw his last round and achieved his personal set goal of a 50% result (5.5/11). By the way, if you are interested in off-beat openings, have a look at the games of Tony Spirov with Black. He plays the Scandinavian variation known as the Patzer Variation (3...Qe5+) and a variation of that Variation (3...Qe6+). Very tricky!

Now to the Australian Juniors. It looks like even GM Ian Rogers agrees with me and is backing Cedric Antolis to win the title in his Sun Herald column of today. Presently after R9, Cedric is joint leader with Yi Yuan (both won their games)and it looks like a fight to the finish by these two since the others are 1.5 points behind.




In the Girls U18, it is a similar story except there is a clear sole leader ahead by 1.5 points, Sally Yu. In the U12, Queenslander Liu Yi's hopes have been dented after being defeated by fellow Q'lander, Callum Gray. But the margin only increased by 0.5 points since NSW Sean Gu was held to a draw by WA Sam Ryan. However, Sean has been the receipient of a favour from fellow junior from NSW, Daniel Zhang who defeated Q'lander, Daniel Lapitan. So it is now Sean, sole leader on 7/9, Liu Yi, Callum Gray and Daniel Zhang, joint 2nd-4th on 6.5/9, with Daniel Lapitan, Sam Ryan and Martin Jack further back on 6/9.




In the Girls U12, Caroline Shan defeated Mirakla Mithran and they are now joint leaders with ACT Joanne Mason. However, Joanne's last two games are against Mirakla and Caroline!


Here is Caroline's loss from the previous round.


Next tournament: the NSW Australia Day weekender ...... Meanwhile Australian Juniors continue for another two nail-biting days!!!

Australian Open/Norths U1600/Australian Juniors

A day of many surprises! We now have a five-way tie at the top of the table (7/9)in the Australian Open and Victorian junior, Eugene Schon, is in the midst of the leaders with NSW junior Max Illingworth, amongst three players 0.5 point behind. Eugene did not make it 3/3 in scalping Jesse Sales who managed to hold back the Schon-time for one more round. Eugene has a chance tomorrow playing black against IM Mark Chapman since his two scalps were taken when playing black. Max has to beware of Vladimir Smirnov who has white. I doubt we are going to see the Tromp but you never know ...... Smirnov senior will be better prepared since Smirnov junior has an easier game tomorrow. Speaking of which, 8 yo NSW junior Anton Smirnov is now the outright leader of the Norths U1600 with 7.5/9 (my prediction from yesterday was spot on) when his two co-leaders only managed to draw each other and thus is 0.5 point behind. I do not see anyone catching Anton and he might have an easier draw in the last round. BUT, if Anton and Cedric Koh both win tomorrow, we might see a last round battle between these two experienced juniors. Cedric then has the chance to deny Anton the 1st placing. Oh Yay! Bring it on!

Even though it is not a junior game but I found the game on the top board of R9 fascinating. All kudos to George Xie for finding the way to a win. From move 37, you can see George's plan being executed. Here is the game:


In the Australian Juniors, we are now at R8 and Cedric Antolis is now sharing the lead with Yi Yuan, both on 7/8. Andrew Brown is 0.5 points behind. Gene Nakauchi on 5/8 must surely be out of contention having lost the last two games (Yi Yuan and Andrew Brown). Four other players, Samuel Dalton, Sam Grigg, Jonas Muller and Alex Stahnke, are on 5.5 and must win tomorrow to still be with a chance. It seems that Antolis may be showing some of the pressure to maintain the lead since it was disclosed that he twice rejected a draw offer in a seemingly drawn rook and pawn endgame and played on for another 51 moves. If so, bad form! Note that the game score only show moves up to move 62 and there is note that say a draw was later agreed. Perhaps some one got tired of entering the rest of the moves? Form your own opinion:


In the U12, NSW junior Sean Gu has caught up with Liu Yi by defeating him today. Both are on 6.5/8. Queensland's Lapitan is on 6/8 whilst Daniel Zhang (NSW), Callum Gray (Qld and, Sam Ryan (WA) are all on 5.5/8. All the six players are playing each other and must win to keep their chances alive. Oh Yay! Bring it on!

This is the Gu-Liu game which is a= wild attacking version of the good old Giucco Piano Opening. Liu managed to recover in middlegame to a rook and 2 pawns for a knight and bishop (but a worse pawn structure). However, I think in the end, Sean's endgame technique is better.


Meanwhile in the Girls U18, I don't think there is any stopping the Yu-machine. Sally Yu is the sole leader with 5.5/6. After losing narrowly the 2008 U18 title to Deborah Ng (by 0.5 margin), I am sure Sally Yu will not let go of the trophy when she has one hand already on it. There was a big upset in the Girls U12 when top seed and co-leader, Carolin Shan (NSW) was defeated by Jana Pretorius (NSW). It is a very good example of a Queen-hunt by Black! Mirakla Mithran beat Denise Lim to be sole leader with 6/6. There are 3 more rounds to go in this round-robin.


Back to what the ClosetGrandmaster has coined the "Dunnygate", there is an interesting comment to Shaun Press' blog on the matter: http://chessexpress.blogspot.com/2009/01/player-caught-with-computer-at-oz-open.html

Anonymous said...
How many discussions between associates( eg. brothers) on the state of a game in progress go unnoticed - This is another vague area often overlooked and very hard to prove cheating. What does it mean to cheat?
Getting casual advice from a stronger friend whispering too you. Is this cheating? How do you prove verbal cheating - use a voice recorder. Come on. So now it is only electronic cheating that is serious. What a joke.

What do people think? Any first-hand experience of this happening? I certainly have observed an attempt by a player to obtain the opinion of a spectator on his game while it was still being played. But it is very difficult to prove or established to everyone's satisfaction.

Speaking of obtaining proof of cheating, Michael Baron from Victoria has been assiduously trying to clarify how the assistant arbiter managed to observe the junior using a hand-held. It has been pointed out in response that the arbiter peered over the partition in order to make the observation. However, this itself has its own host of problems and issues. Should future arbiters do this in similar situation? I think arbiters might need to re-think carefully their response in view of possible legal ramifications.

For anyone interested in the issue, there was, serendipitously, a thread on the issue at ChessPub Forum: http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1229096002/28#28

Moral: Cheating sucks!! But catching out cheats is very very difficult and fraught with legal difficulties.

Australian Open/Norths U1600/Australian Juniors

Wow, a lot have certainly occurred since the last blog. There 's the cheating and expulsion saga, "where are the kings", and the rise and rise of the Victorian juniors expecially Schon-time and Antolis-time. Is it March and March-hare madness? No, it is still only January but that has not deterred madness from erupting, both in Sydney and in Adelaide (see end of post)

I won't say anymore about the cheating and expulsion saga but summaries are here and here. But on the positive note, the Victorian Juniors are taking over. Eugene Schon scored his second upset at the Australian Open beating Vladimir Smirnov with black pieces. At the endgame, Smirnov tested Schon's mettle and he was not found wanting! It is impressive how he kept his cool and found all the correct moves with technical precision and denied Smirnov any chance of a last gasp swindle. Here is the game:


Where the father lost, the son proves triumphant. Anton Smirnov is co-leader of the Norths U1600 with 6.5/8 after outplaying the previous sole leader (and still co-leader), Calvin Bennett, with white pieces in a miniature featuring the Open Sicilian. Perhaps the father spent too much time preparing the son and neglected his own prep? The game:


As promised, another miniature from R5 with Cedric Koh who unfortunately lost today to the 3rd co-leader (and junior) Dawen Shi.


In the Open, IM Alek Wohl is leading with an impressive 7/8 with Eugene Schon and FM Jesse Sales snapping at his heels on 6.5. IM George Xie (making a turnaround after a disastrous 2 losses to Mandla and Schon), IM Mark Chapman and Paul Broekhuyse are on 6. Two other juniors, Max Illingworth and FM james Morris are amongst a group sitting on 5.5. Plenty more excitement to come especially with Schon playing Sales tomorrow. Can Schon repeat giant-killing act no 3?

In the Norths U1600, as mentioned, there are 3 co-leader, Bennett, Shi and Smirnov on 6.5/8. Cedric Koh and Peter Hannagan are on 6. Bennett is playing Shi and he needs to defeat Shi. Why, you may ask? The answer lies in my prediction that Smirnov will defeat Hannagan. My son played Hannagan in an earlier round and was quite close to creating an upset after achieving a favourable advantage. Smirnov should have no problem converting any advantages to a win. In any event, there is always the shadow of the father cast over the opening prep.

I will blog later on Australian Juniors since the results have not been posted as yet. But the latest news from Adelaide is that someone removed/stole all the kings, black and white, from all the chessboards overnight. However, the arbiters and organisers managed to scrounge around for sufficient kings to start the round after a slight delay.

Australian Open/Norths U1600/Australian Junior

Well, well, what do you know, I turned out to be quite good at picking winners. Looking at the Aus Junior after R4, my pick as dark horse favourite, Cedric Antolis, is proving a real winner. Antolis has 4/4 and defeated two ACF >2000 rated players (Yi Yuan 2058 and Gene Nakauchi 2098) along the way. He is playing a 3rd >2000 player tomorrow in R5, Andrew Brown. If he wins (and I hope I have not given him the kiss of death by saying this), he will be firm favourite to win the Aus Junior title. Andrew Brown is also on 4/4 and defeated Samuel Dalton (ACF 2009) along the way. The two NSW players, Nicholas Deen-Cowell and Gill Morris may be finding the competition a lot tougher. Nicholas is on 2/4 and Gill on 1.5/4.

Turning to the U12, NSW favourite and 3rd seed, Sean Gu (ACF 1542), suffered a setback in his attempt for the U12 title. Inexplicably, in R2 (vs Ethan Derwent ACF 943) on the 39th move, he blundered forgetting his rook is en prise on c2. To his credit, he recovered and won his next two games including defeating a dangerous player from Queensland, Martin Jack (ACF 1314). He needs to win all his games from now on and have the opportunity to meet the top (Liu Yi ACF 1805)and 2nd seed Sam Ryan (ACF 1600). Other NSW players, Daniel Zhang and Jasper Hong are on 2/4 whilst Mishael Mithran has 1/4. Jasper may still be in with a chance for the U8 title. I am not sure of the ages of players from other states and so cannot say who is/are his rival/s. In the U12 Girls, looks like Caroline Shan is firming as definite favourite to take the title. Her only rival is Mirakla Mithran, also from NSW. Also on 2/2 Denise Lim who is unrated and therefore a possible dark horse. There are on NSW competitors in the U18 Girls.

To Australian Open, it looks like FM Jesse Sales is on a very hot streak at the moment, sitting alone on 5/5. He defeated Mark Chapman (top seed) in R4 and FM James Morris in R5. Sales has yet to play IM George Xie and FM Vladimir Smirnov. He meets IM Alek Wohl tomorrow in R6. The highest placed junior is Eugene Schon on 4/5. His only loss was against Alek Wohl in R3.

In the Norths U1600, junior Edward Naoumov (ACF 1483) is now sole first with 5/5 after defeating fellow junior Dawen Shi in R5 in a long game. Half a point behind is Calvin Bennett and junior Cedric Koh (ACF 1376). Speaking of Cedric, he won a miniature in R5 against Chris Brown (ACF 1519). I will post the game once the pgn is available.

Australian Open 2009/Norths Chess Club Centenary Year Under 1600 Tournament/Australian Juniors 2009

Got back from the Australian Open 2009/Norths Chess Club Centenary Year Under 1600 Tournament in Brookvale, Sydney where it has been an eventful second day. There were two rounds today.

First, some non-junior news. Biggest upset of the day have to be ex-junior Blair Mandla defeating IM George Xie with White. The game went down to the wire in a tense endgame. Similarly on 1st board, IM Mark Chapman overcame Armen Ayvazyan in another K+R+2P vs K+N+3 Ps endgame. Results and games can be accessed here: http://www.nswca.org.au/AO2009/index.shtml

Now back to juniors. What is it about juniors (or just weaker players) that they get themselves into a winning position and blunders away the win. In Round 2 of the Norths Chess Club Centenary Year Under 1600 Tournament, it happened to Clarise Koh ACF 1038 (vs Nikola Ivanov ACF 1539) who had a rook for a knight. It happened to Dylan Siow-Lee ACF 598 (vs Peter Hannagan ACF 1478) who had an extra rook but blundered the two rooks and lost! The saddest case was Noah Gong ACF 422 who survived the opening and middlegame against David Hughes ACF 1367 into an equal endgame but fell victim to a combination where pieces were exchanged and back rank checkmate resulted. But as with other tournaments, the juniors managed to spring some surprises and upsets, eg, Jerry Xu ACF 1069 defeating Michael Tracy ACF 1450.

In R3 of the Norths Chess Club Centenary Year Under 1600 Tournament, there occurred the biggest comeback I have seen: Matthew Cervenjack ACF 1299 vs Clarise Koh ACF 1038. Matthew reached a very dangerous attacking position by move 31 but could not convert the initiative into a point. He went on to blunder a Q to a fork. Clarise did very well to defend tenaciously and refusing to give up. A lesson for all juniors.



[Challenge: Can you do better than W from move 31? without resorting to silicon power?]

We have two juniors amongst the leaders of the Norths Chess Club Centenary Year Under 1600 Tournament, Dawen Shi ACF 1466 and Edward Naoumov 1483 at 3/3 with Cedric Koh half a point behind. An interesting junior vs junior contest between Anton Smirnov and Jerry Xu today.

In the Open, juniors are part of the chasing pack at 2.5/3 (Max Illingworth, Adrian Kong) whilst Victorian FM James Morris is still amongst the leaders with 3/3. Oscar Wang is at 2/3 whilst Jack Ruan and Kevin Tan are 1.5/3. Other juniors are struggling a bit with the tough opposition (Emma Guo, Luthien Russell and Alek Papp on 0.5/3). Interesting struggle between Max and James today.

What's in store for 2009?

Here we are at the start of a brand new year, 2009. What's in store for junior chess in Australia?

I find it interesting that the Australian Juniors Chess Championship are held in January of each year. (For that matter, the Australian Championship and the Australian Open are also held in January.) Sort of establishing the pecking order for the year? Of course this ignores the readily observable fact that improvement in performance is not linear in junior chess. A junior may begin the year at x-rating but come December, may actually be performing at x+500 rating.

Another interesting take on this comes from the old chinese adage: There is always a higher mountain than the one you are on. Similar words of wisdom also sprouted from the mouth of GM Ian Rogers at the beginning of Aus Junior Open 2008 in Sydney. In Sydney, at the beginning of 2008, we saw the appearance of the Ruan brothers, originally from the Land of the Long White Cloud, New Zealand Aeteoroa. My son played Harry Ruan first round in the NSWJCL Two-Day Tournament and lost. That may have been Harry's first NSW junior chess game. (The story would have been better if my son actually beat Harry and can then boast that he beat Harry in his very first game in NSW. Alas, the Fates do not weave/spin kindly their web.) Of course Harry came across the Tasman with the NZ U-10 title. Harry and his older brother, Jack, have taken NSW junior chess by storm. Harry is now rated ACF 1614 and Jack ACF 1643. However, I just found out that Jack is also rated FIDE 1908!! I checked FIDE records and the rating is due to Jack's excellent result in the recent World Youth Chess Championship in Vietnam. (Puzzling query: Why isn't Harry similarly rated? or Cedric Koh? or Clarise Koh? Perhaps someone can enlighten?) Of course, proof of their impact in NSW junior chess lies also in the recent Aus Primary Schools Championship where Penshurst Public comprising of Jack, Harry, Cedric and Clarise, managed to add another winners trophy to their bulging cabinet. I wonder who will emerge in 2009? (BTW, my son met Harry again in the Aus Juniors 2008 and again lost. However, he is happy that he managed to take a point off the mighty Penshurst Public when his school met Penshurst in the NSW Metropolitan inter-Zone by beating Harry with white (but losing with black). Ahem! Observe that Penshurst only dropped 2 or 3 points in total in their march to victory in the NSW Metropolitan Primary Schools Chmapionship.)

It is a strange phenomenon that we seem to have strong juniors who emerge and dominate the scene and then fade away (probably or very possibly due to school, studies etc). Very few re-emerge in their early 20s to dominate the adult chess scene. The exceptions are Zhao ZongYuan and David Smerdon. We have in recent past seen a very strong young junior blaze in the sky like a comet only to fade away ...

Speaking of impact, my previous post alluded to the Victorian (actually Kiwi) junior, Bobby Cheng(ACF 2085). Well, he just won the 2008 Canterbury Summer Swiss with a score of 7/8 (+6 +2 -0). On the way to the winner podium, he beat top seed, Sam Chow (ACF 2328) (who himself was a very strong and talented junior) with black in a Nimzo-Indian game. But I must say (without taking anything away from Bobby's achievement) that White played poorly in the game. A Melbournian FM is already saying that Bobby is IM material and will achieve that title in 3-4 years time. I sincerely hope so but 3-4 years is a long, long, soooo very looooooong time in a junior's life.

The tournament was a very good warm-up for Victorian juniors. Eugene Schon and Cedric Antolis were joint 3rd (6/8). Watch out everyone at the Aus Juniors, the Victorians are coming!!! Check out full results at http://chessvictoria.netfirms.com/csas_results.htm

On that point, and speaking as a NSW chess parent, it is a shame there wasn't any similar strong tournament in Sydney to serve as a warm-up.

For the next 9 days (excepting Tuesday which is rest day), I will be making the trek over the hills to the beaches, the suburb of Brookvale, where the Australian Open is being held. I will try to post news and results and possibly games, if I can. Anyone reading this and playing in the Australian Open (or the Aus Juniors) can email me at wengnian.siow8@gmail.com with news items, games and/or even gossip tidbits, god forbid!

BTW, HAVE A HAPPY WONDERFUL FABULOUS PHANTASMOGORIC 2009!?!?!?