CHESS
Hat trick — just
Raymond Keene
Congratulations to the English Olym- pic team, which has won the silver medals in Greece. But it was a narrow squeak, for Holland's 21/2-11/2 win over England in the last round brought them level on 341/2 points, England taking the silver on a complicated tie-break. This is the third consecutive occasion on which we have come in second to the Russians. I wrote in my Olympic preview, two weeks ago, that we might even have a chance for the gold this time, but the Soviets somehow buried their internal differences and put on a flawless performance, winning by a wide margin. Against a team containing Kaspar- ov and Karpov in top form, there is not
much to be done. As I predicted, though, we made a terrible mess of the other state-supported sides from Eastern Europe, with excellent wins against Roma- nia, East Germany and Hungary. A not- able feature of the English school of chess is their ability to score well with Black, as this week's games show.
In the women's event Hungary, repre- sented by the three Po!gar sisters, pipped the Soviets to win the title by half a point.
Knaak-Speelman: Olympics, East Germany v England; Old Indian Defence.
1 d4 d6 2 c4 Strange as it may seem, this is probably already an error. White should prefer the more flexible 2e4. 2. . . e5 3 N13 This is also a mistake which cedes Black too great a com- mand of the centre. White should play 3 Nc3. 3 . . . e4 4 Ng5 f5 5 Nc3 c6 6 Nh3 Na6 7 e3 Nf6 8 d5 g6 9 b3 Bg7 10 Bb2 0-011 Qd2 Ng4 12 Be2 Nc5 13 Rd 1 The final mistake after which White's king can never escape Black's attack. Instead, White should flee the danger zone with 13 0-0-0. 13. . . Qh4 14 Na4 f4 15 Bxg7 fxe3 16 Qc3 Rxf2 17 Bh8 Rxg2+ 18 Kfl Ne5 White resigns.
Anderson-Short: Olympics, Sweden v England; Queen's Gambit Declined.
1 N13 d5 2 d4 Nf6 3 c4 e6 4 Nc3 11e7 5 Bg5 h6 6 Bh4 0-0 7 e3 b6 8 Rd Bh7 9 a.3 A somewhat eccentric and harmless treatment of the open- ing. 9 . . Nbd7 10 cxd5 exd5 11 Be2 c5 12 0-0 Ne4 13 Bxe7 Qxe7 14 dxc5 Nxc3 15 Rxc3 bxc5 16 Qc2 Rab8 17 Rd l Ba8 18 b3 Rfe8 19 Bfl Qd6 20 Qdl Red8 21 Nd2 d4 22 Nc4 Qf6 23 Rd3 Nf8 Black already has an excellent position. White's next move sacrifices a pawn to gain some counterplay but White's compensation never really looks adequate. 24 b4 dxe3 25 Nxe 3 cxb4 26 axb4 Rxd3 27 Qxd3 Rxb4 28 Rc8 Bb7 29 Nd5 Bxd5 30 Qxd5 Qe7 31 g3 g6 32 Qc6 Rd4 33 Qc3 Rd1 34 Qc4 a5 35 Ra8 QM 36 Qa6 Kg7 37 Qe2 Rd l and White lost on time with three moves still to make before reaching the time-control. The general consensus was that Black should win with his extra pawn.
Pinter-Nunn: Olympics, Hungary v England; King's Indian Defence. 1 d4 N16 2 c4 g6 3 Nc3 Bg7 4 e4 d6 5 0e2 0-06 N13 CS 7 0-0 Nc6 8 d5 Ne7 9 Nel Nd7 10 13 15 11 g4 Kh8 The system based on g4 is normally attributed to the American Grandmaster, Pal Benko. Its point is to pre-empt Black's king's
side counterplay, but I have never trusted it. To me it seems that White should inevitably suffer through the loosening of his king's side pawn structure. 12 Ng2 a5 13 h4 Nc5 14 Be3 Ng8 15 Rbl Bd7 16 b3 b6 17 a3 a4 18 b4 Nb3 19 Nb5 Nf6 20 exf5 gxf5 21 Nc3 e4 22 g5 Nh5 23 fxe4 14 This pawn sacrifice is curiously reminiscent of Black's play in the Gheorghiu-Kasparov game I gave last week. Once again, a pawn is offered to dominate the dark squares, but on this occasion White's king finds himself even more conspi- cuously in the firing line. 24 Bd2 Nxd2 25 Qxd2 Qe8 26 Bf3 Ng3 27 Rfel Be5 28 Ne2 Nxe4 29 Bxe4 13 30 Nef4 fxg2 31 Nxg2 Qh5 32 Qd3 Bg4 33 Re3 Qf7 34 Qd2 Qg7 35 Rd3 Rf7 36 Rel Raf8 37 Ne3 R14 38 Ng2 R4f7 39 Ne3 Bh5 Naturally, Black does not agree to a draw by repetition. 40 Rfl Rxfl+ 41 Nxil RN Now this is deadly. 42 Qel Bd4+ 43 Kg2 Qe5 44 Ng3 Bg4 45 b5 B12 46 Qxt4 Bh3+ White resigns.
To round off, a few interesting statistics from Greece: Kasparov has made the best overall rating with a performance of 2877; then comes Portisch, with 2790, Karpov 2767 and, in fourth place, England's Jon Speelman with 2693. Other good English results were Short 2649 (the eighth best overall) and Nunn 2630. In the women's event Akhmilovskaya (USSR) came out top with 2570 ahead of Judit Polgar (2558) in spite of the latter's amazing 111/2 out of 12 score. To celebrate her fine result Akhmilovskaya eloped before the end of the tournament with John Donaldson, non-playing captain of the US men's team. The couple are now in Frankfurt, en route to the US.
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