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.

It started slowly. On boards 1 and 3 we had the traditional small plus with white while on boards 2 and 4 we had the traditional small minus with black. While we kept things control on our white boards (I kept a small plus which I let dissipate after a miscalculation against their highest rated player, GM Escobar Forero) things started to go berserk on our black boards.

On board 2 Pancevski had a great chance to take over the initiative early on after a fine pawn sacrifice:

And on board 4 we even got more lucky. Take a look at this:

And so we can feel lucky tonight in Baku! But I’m not sure there are casinos here.

The favourites have started playing each other and Ukraine beat Russia in the heavyweight showdown. Volokitin played a great combination to beat Grischuk with black:

But things were still looking good for the Russians, as Nepomniachtchi beat Korobov to level the score and Tomashevsky was totally dominating against Ponomariov. Kramnik on board 1 was keeping it steady against Eljanov, so it looked like the Russians would win. And then this happened:

The World Champion made a second draw in a row, today against the Australian GM and a very cool guy David Smerdon. David played his usual Alapin Sicilian and Carlsen was even in some trouble at one point.

Worth noting is also the collapse of the mighty-looking English team. They lost 3.5-0.5 against the Netherlands – they were wobbly from the start and this only underlines their troubles. It seems that almost everybody (except Short) is out of form!

Tomorrow is Round 5. I don’t know what to expect from the pairings for us, but I will find out anyway in a couple of hours (or less).

Does the 0-4 result reflect the difference between strong amateurs and professionals? – While I wouldn’t call ourselves amateurs, our opponents are definitely hard-core professionals. If we take into account the amount of work they have put into preparations for this Olympiad and resources they had at their disposal, perhaps they deserved to beat us 0-4. The fact that the positions offered us good chances means little, missed chances are rued only by the losing team. It’s always difficult to assess these things as anything can happen in one game, but generally speaking it is expected of them to beat us heavily.

Or do your opponent simply play more regular competitions? – This is definitely true, not only they play regular competitions, they also play opposition of the highest level, thus getting accustomed to high-tension games and making moves of high quality. This is only one of the many advantages the elite has.

Or are they more motivated, being the home team? – They must be very motivated playing in front of their crowd, although I think motivation has little to do in the match against us – they would have done similarly even if they weren’t that motivated, simply the difference in class is too big.

Or do they get better sleep because they are staying at home or with relatives, in the case where they come from another city in Azerbaijan? – Actually they stay in a hotel, staying at home or with relatives is something to be avoided during a tournament. As much as you get support, the closest family is also a big distraction and this is detrimental during a tournament. This was a mistake Radjabov made in 2013 when he had a lot of friends and relatives with him in London during the Candidates tournament, he was distracted, played badly and finished last.

Or do they have a team of coaches on hand to assess the likely openings and preferred styles of their opponents? – Yes, this is definitely the case. With full governmental support and many training camps before the Olympiad they (and not only they, the other favourites like Russia, USA, China etc. also have teams of coaches and training sessions) get the best conditions one can imagine. Azerbaijan’s main coach and captain is GM Dreev and their other official helper is GM Bacrot.

Any thoughts as to why they were able to win when your team had good chances? – I touched upon the various topics that contributed to their big win above. Generally speaking they had everything better than us – quality, preparation, support, coaches, conditions. They were the better team and the question is more why we didn’t take our chances. Of all of the above explanations, I feel that the most important is that we simply have no experience playing such strong opposition. If we play strong players on a regular basis then this match would have been one of the many and it would have been a normal occurrence. And with normal occurrences it is likely to expect a normal result. As it is, we play these people perhaps once per year, so you cannot really expect to perform and take your chances in one single match.

Moving on from our loss, in Round 3 we came back with a vengeance and beat Pakistan 1-3. I think it should have been 0-4, but a win is a win, and without a loss too. It is due to inexperience that our young players drew from winning positions, but they will learn.

On board 1 Pancevski chose the Leningrad Dutch against IM Lodhi and it led to a heavy strategic battle. Pancevski likes this type of play and he’s very good at it. It takes a lot of energy and concentration to play well these difficult positions, but he was the better player and outplayed his opponent around the time-control. A fully deserved victory.

I won a good game too, after my opponent committed a known inaccuracy in the Alekhine Defence I got a better position, played solidly throughout and finished it off with a nice combination that resembled some of Alekhine’s combinations (quite fitting for the opening!) – the great champion also liked to play on the whole board, often combining attacks on various wings. Here I combined the attack on his king with a penetration along the c-file and double attacks on his rook and f8.

On board 3 Lazov quickly took over the initiative with black in an Exchange KID and obtained a winning position, but then allowed his opponent to save himself.

Similarly, Nikolovski won a pawn after nicely outplaying his FM opponent, but in time trouble wasn’t very precise.

Still, a victory without a loss is always pleasing and it is important that we were never in danger in the match. Of course, tomorrow we will get much tougher opponents, but for now we can enjoy our good day.

As expected, we played a strong team, although I didn’t expect us to play that up high and play the hosts! The result of the match, 0-4 defeat, didn’t really show the tension of the match.

On board 1 we had a good position but then Mamedyarov started to outplay Nedev when all of a sudden he allowed a great chance:

Black’s last move was 28…h5? and now white could have gained an advantage by 29 f5!, the idea being that 29…Ng5 is met by 30 Qf1! and if 30…Ne4 then 31 fg fg and 32 Qd3, winning. Alas, Nedev missed this chance and lost in time trouble.

On board 2 Radjabov pressed Pancevski in a Philidor and unfortunately didn’t allow any chances.

On board 3 I was better for most part of the game against Mamedov, but as I was getting low on time the quality of my moves began to suffer.

On board 4 our youngster Nikolovski had a good position after the opening against Naiditsch, but in time trouble he allowed white to active his queen and this turned out to be decisive.

Judging from the positions we had after the openings we had a rather balanced match, but when the tension rose our opponents were much superior in handling it – the quality of their moves remained more or less the same, while the quality of ours dropped drastically.

On the other boards the favourites were generally doing their job, perhaps a bit surprising was England’s win of only 2.5-1.5 against Indonesia, Adams drawing with Muhammad Ali and Sadikin The beating McShane.

Tomorrow we play Pakistan, not the strongest of teams, but we still need to win.

I had a walk around the centre of Baku tonight and here’re a few photos. The city feels rich and the vast distances and spaces remind me of the other former Soviet cities I have been to, Moscow and Saratov. Wide boulevards and walking areas, big parks, imposing buildings and architecture. It’s still early and I expect to start to feel its essence as I explore it every day a bit more.