Page 2 - Van Foreest News Today

Flashy games were seen on the top boards of both sections in round 6 of the European Team Chess Championships. In the open, England obtained a clear 3½-½ victory over the Netherlands to join Germany in the lead. Romania and Serbia are sharing third place, a match point behind the co-leaders. Meanwhile, in the women’s tournament, France became the sole leader after beating the top seeds from Georgia. | Pictured: Michael Adams, who turned 52 years old on Friday | Photo: Mark Livshitz

Magnus Carlsen’s Offerspill had a stellar performance at the 2023 European Chess Club Cup. The tournament took place in Dürres, Albania at the start of October. GM Karsten Müller found plenty of endgame highlights to share with us ChessBase readers. Find here thirteen instructive positions, with helpful, to-the-point analyses — perfect for those looking to improve their endgame abilities! | Pictured: David Anton | Photo: Niki Riga

Karthikeyan Murali became the third Indian player to ever beat Magnus Carlsen in a classical chess game, as he defeated the former world champion with the black pieces in round 7 of the Qatar Masters. Thanks to the upset win, Karthikeyan joined a 6-player leading pack with two rounds to go in Doha. Smilarly, David Paravyan became a co-leader by beating one of the rating favourites, as he got the better of Dommaraju Gukesh on board 5. | Photo: Aditya Sur Roy

With eleven opening articles, ChessBase Magazine #215 covers the usual broad spectrum and provides new repertoire ideas for every tournament player. For example, a concept against the Alekhine Defence: Sergey Grigoriants presents the "sharpest and most principled approach against the Alekhine Defence" with 5.f4! and is convinced that he has "proved White's advantage in all variations". Alekhine expert Christian Bauer attests our author an "excellent job. I now know w...

ChessBase Magazine offers a window to the world of professional chess. The latest issue, CBM 215 is just out. Here our columnist, Nagesh Havanur takes a look at a recent issue. 162 games (41 annotated), decisive encounters from World Championship deeply annotated. 12 opening surveys, 3 opening videos, 9 demo lectures and several exercises for training. Annotators include Anish Giri, Boris Gelfand and Peter Svidler among others. The icing on the cake is a feature on Boris Spassky with 27 annotat...

Magnus Carlsen, Leinier Dominguez and Parham Maghsoodloo were the three 2700+ players who kicked off with a win in round 3 of the FIDE World Cup. Meanwhile, Daniele Vocaturo and Ivan Schitco upset higher-rated opponents, and Peter Svidler obtained a good-looking, 27-move win over Jorden van Foreest. Among the women, there were no big upsets, as the Muzychuk sisters had a good day — Mariya won and Anna escaped with a draw. | Photo: FIDE / Stev Bonhage

The Italian Game has become popular again in top chess in recent years, not least because it often leads to interesting positions rich in content. In ChessBase Magazine #214 Sergey Grigoriants uses games by Nakamura, Carlsen, Kasimdzhanov and others to show a concept that promises Black "relatively easy play": with 10...Re8 Black prepares the exchange of the light-squared bishops on e6.

Spassky is considered one of the most gifted players ever. A fine attacker and equally strong in the middlegame and endgame, the term universal style was coined for him. For CBM 214 we invited our authors to comment on their favourite Boris Spassky games. The result is a collection of 27 first-class annotated Spassky games from the period 1949 to 1989. You can take a look at two samples here. Enjoy!

Professionals today have tight schedules. There are many more tournaments in the world, with the extra addition of online events. After Norway Chess, the Global Chess League in Dubai and the Grand Chess Tour event in Zagreb, Magnus Carlsen is now playing in the Aimchess Rapid — with no signs of fatigue. Carlsen beat Jorden van Foreest, and will face Fabiano Caruana next. | Photos: Lennart Ootes / Grand Chess Tour

Evgeny Postny examines in the current ChessBase Magazine #214 the variation 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Bd3 Nc6 5.c3 Nf6 6.h3 (which, in contrast to the main continuation 6.Bf4, prevents the development of Black's bishop to g4) with the active advance 6...e5. From Postny's point of view a sound reaction, which “offers Black adequate play in all variations” even though an isolani on d5 will be involved.