Baku Olympiad 2016 – Round 5

We played the very strong team from Peru and we lost heavily.

It was an uneven match. This time however our youngsters didn’t play well. Lazov forgot his theory on the black side of a Najdorf on move 20 (yes, that’s early theory in the Najdorf, especially the English Attack, which they played) and Nikolovski opened with 1 f4 and by move 15 was worse.

Nedev on board 1 played a good game, he even had better chances at one point with black against GM Cordova. In the end it was a repetition of moves and a draw. The match couldn’t be saved even if Pancevski won, still he played a good game, but what happened was characteristic – when the position was a draw his opponent, GM Cori, pressed on and it paid off – our player erred and lost.

Tonight is the Bermuda Party so it’s good time to shake off this defeat and feel better.

Here’re a couple of games that caught my eye from today’s round.

Even though I ceased to play the King’s Indian with black I still like seeing great KID games. The following one is fantastic:

The second game is between Shirov and Rapport. This should already give you an idea of what follows. It’s better to let the moves speak for themselves.

Time to eat dinner now. Tomorrow is the only rest day (I have no idea why they got rid of the second one, which was always before the last round) and time to relax.

Alex Colovic
A professional player, coach and blogger. Grandmaster since 2013.
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2 Comments
  • Sep 7,2016 at 8:01 pm

    Thanks for your comment Franklin, "adults only" is a pretty good description! 🙂

  • Sep 7,2016 at 2:54 pm

    Hilarious, Shirov-Rapport is an "adults only" game, not to be viewed with one's beginner chess students. "But, but, you said we should develop our pieces, not leave our pieces unprotected and get taken, and you definitely told us to castle to safety early in the opening!" Thanks for sharing.

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