Tabatabaei wins Biel Masters 2019
Iran no.3 GM M. Amin Tabatabaei scored 7.0/9, finishing a half point ahead of a pack of ten players who finished at 6.5/9, and won Biel Master Tournament 2019. Tabatabaei did not have the perfect start as he lost his third round game against GM Athanasios Mastrovasilis of Greece. GM Gata Kamsky of USA and Alexander Donchenko of Germany shared 2nd position as they had all their tie-break scores same. GM Abhimanyu Puranik had the best finish among Indians as he scored unbeaten 6.5/9 with a performance rating of 2693 and secured tied 2nd position. GM G N Gopal had the next best finish from India as he scored 6.0/9 and secured tied 3rd position. Photo: Simon Bohnenblust / Biel Chess Festival
Terrific Tabatabaei, Abhimanyu awesome at Biel Masters 2019
The Masters Open of the Biel festival heated up significantly after the rest day, as the lead changed hands consistently and finally Seyyed Mohammad Amin Tabatabaei of Iran put in that extra bit of push towards the final stretch to win the tournament. (You have to remember that he was on 4.0/5 when we left him last, after losing in the third round against Greek GM Athanasios Mastrovasilis - game given below) Consider this:
Jeffery Xiong, Ante Brkic and Erigaisi Arjun on lead with 5.0/6. (Tabatabaei follows on 4.5/6).
Tabatabaei, Iturrizaga, Donchenko, Manuel Petrosyan too join them for a Seven (!) way tie on 5.5/7.
Tabatabaei shoots ahead with 6.5/8.
Tabatabaei wins the event with 7.0/9, after a (lacklustre) final round with many draws.
First of all, the game which Tabatabaei lost in the 3rd round had a beautiful Geometry:
Tabatabaei - Mastrovasilis, round 3
9.0-0 might have been played for the surprise value, more than anything. 9.Bd4 Qb4+ 10.Nbd2 Qxc4 11.Nxc4 Bb4+ 12.Nfd2 leaves White with more than enough compensation for the pawn.
12. Na3? inexplicable - after bottling up black's queen, it is logically expected that white would want to swallow her instead of letting her escape. White should have gone for the eccentric looking 12.Ne1! (Threatening Bf3 trapping the queen) Qh5 13.a3
It is still a glorious mess with white having the initiative but black has better resources now.
This looks obvious, but overlooks a crucial tactical detail, which white probably overlooked.
Looks straightforward, but look for a Geometry here for black! 14...Nd3 this intermezzo seals the day for Black. 15.Qc3 Bxa3 16.Bxh8 Bb2! The point! The black bishop does a reverse turn with Bf8xa3-b2xh8 to save the day for black! Not every day that you see such an artistic straight lines on the board.
Round 6
The top seeded Jeffery Xiong’s win over Alexander Donchenko helping him to join the lead was typical of the American in many ways: he showed his preparation in the opening with a typical move of the modern computerised times, and the end of the game was a flurry of ‘shots’ which Xiong was to show more in the ensuing rounds.
Xiong - Donchenko, round 6
Needless to say, this was popularised by one evil dude Parimarjan Negi, who was writing books on how to win with white pieces against all existing openings which the whole world follows!
A new move in this position. In a way, we can call this an example of modern opening preparation - watch how the game unfolds.
Now, 13.g5 was not a completely correct move, but to exploit it, black had to respond with way too much creativity here. 14...Rc8 and black doesn't find it, though he too has an evil idea here. Believe it or not, black's best line of play is a completely 'computerised' one here: 14...b4!? 15.axb4 a5!? 16.bxa5 Qxa5 17.Nb3 Qb6 and the open kingside gives better prospects for black in the long run. But I wouldn't be surprised if Xiong had prepared it all before: after all, it is not easy to play like this over the board, and white could have found a way to hold on to things dear in his preparations before the game.
White's idea behind this move is really cute. A routine white move would have shown black's hand: 15.Bg2 Qb6 16.Kb1 Rxc3! The point behind 14...Rc8. Now you must be able to see the idea behind WHITE's 15th move!?
That's it. White kind of stops Black's play on the queenside, and enjoys a certain 'advantage of a defender' here. Black finds it difficult to do much.
22...Kf8?? More than anything, this is that exact kind of position where Xiong excels. Try to see what Xiong saw here.
25.Rxe4! Very nice - it is indeed not an easy job to see the whole variation. On the other hand, white must have seen the whole variation for it to work to the end.
26.f5! Cool! a simple pawn push at the end of a series of sacrifices is always a tactical delight! 26...Rxh4 27.fxe6 Qc7 28.Rf1+ Rh4 29.Qh6+ 1-0
In a fight between two Indian GMs, young Arjun was benefited by a strange blunder from Gopal:
Gopal - Arjun, round 6
White was better throughout the game, and he commits harakiri here: 25.Bxe5? borne out of a horrible miscalculation. 25.Be2 would have simply preserved the Bishop pair and hence a slight edge.
26.gxf6?? OOOOOOPS! 26...dxe5 27.fxe7 Rxf1+ 28.Ka2 Kf7 29.Rxe5 Ke8 and Black went on to win! An inexplicable blind spot, needless to say.
There was a cute point by young Vincent Keymer in this round:
Erdos - Keymer, round 6
Black could probably have defended the position with 23...Qf5 here, but Keymer showed some creativity here: 23...Qxf3!? 24.gxf3 [24.Rxe8+?? Nxe8-+ as the white queen is attacked too] 24...Rxe1+ 25.Kg2 Bxb3 26.axb3 g6 and black went on to hold the game, as white doesn't have any breaks and the lone Queen can't do much against black's embargo with the knight and rook:
Round 7
Nothing much happened in the round between the leaders, which enabled three from lower boards to join them on lead. Young Keymer played beautiful positional chess to outplay the higher rated Iturrizaga Bonelli, only to see it all vanish under pressure:
Keymer - Iturrizaga, round 7
After an uneven opening and early middlegame, things finally started happening here: 26.Kg2 White has a specific idea here: to exchange light bishops and thus gaining a little more edge due to dominating light squares on the kingside. 26...Qb6?! Black should have been alert to white's threat and played 26...h5 Positional alertness! Watch out for Black's play sticking to basics here 27.Rxc8 Rxc8 28.Ne3 Ng4 more basics: stopping the exchange of light bishops 29.Ndf1 Be7! even more basics: activatig the sleeping piece! 30.Nf5 Bxf5 31.exf5 Nf8 with a complicated position, where black still holds the balance.
31.Nb1! The point, white finds a target in the weak b5
43.Ncd1+- Black's play on the kingside seems to have stopped - what can go wrong for White here?
57.Qc2?? Throwing the advantage away. In certain ways, it is even more difficult to hold your nerves with a winning position if the opponent has even a semblance of threats. 57...gxf5 58.gxf5
58...Nxd5!! with this elegant sacrifice, black gains a draw... atleast 59.exd5 Qxd5 60.Kg1 Nf3+ 61.Kf2 Nd4 62.Rc8+ Kg7
63.Qc7+?? White goes berserk in the second time control. 63.Rc7+ Kh8 64.Rc8+ would have been a draw. 63...Kh6 64.Qc1+ Kh5-+ 65.Rc3 Rg8 66.Qe3 Qh1 0-1
Donchenko and Tabatabaei had smooth wins over Aryan Chopra and Andrei Shchekachev respectively to become joint leaders.
Round 8
The crucial round, when an important game which proved to be the tournament decider went in favour of Tabatabatei:
Xiong - Tabatabaei, round 8
12.Rfd1 A quiet position battle seems to be on the cards. Nothing special happening - the position should be level. 12...cxd4 13.Nb5 This position is not as great as it looks, if you visually get prejudiced by Black's isolated pawn on d5. After all, the white knight on e5 is not comfortably placed. 13...Nc5 14. Qf3 [14.Qxd4 Ne6 15.Qd2 Nxf4 16.gxf4] 14...Nce4 15.Nd3 Rc8?! There was no need to throw away a7
16.Bh3? There was no reason NOT to grab the a7! 16...Rc4 17.Ne5?? His strength becomes his weakness here: Xiong looks for activity, overlooking a crucial detail in the position. Better was 17.b3 Rc3! The point!
18.Rac1 Bc5! 19.Nxc3 dxc3 20.Nxc5 bxc5 21.Rxc3 Nxc3 22.Qxc3 Ne4 and black is still better, but only slightly.
Suddenly, black has big threats: ...g7-g5 and ...a7-a6 18.e3?? Rxe5! 19.Bxe5 Ng5 20.Qf5 Nxh3+ 21.Qxh3 dxe3-+ 22.Bd4 Qe8 23.Bxc5 bxc5 24.Nd6 exf2+ 25.Kf1 Rc2! 0-1
In certain ways, Xiong was a victim of his own style here. In what could have been a typical positional maneuvering game, he tried to impose his will with active play, and was punished instantly by Tabatabaei. As it turned out, this top board game turned out to be the most crucial game of the event.
Gata Kamsky is a legend in his own way, who has fought battles with the legends of Karpov and Anand in his younger days. He has a remarkable board presence in the tournament hall, which you cannot help admiring. In this round, he showed glimpses of his depth of chess understanding in the game against young Erigaisi Arjun, who had hurt his feet during his flight journey to Europe and was visibly not sitting comfortable at the board throughout the tournament:
Gata Kamsky - Erigaisi Arjun, round 8
A quiet opening in Kamsky's style, but now he brings his speciality to the board. 15.b4!? The engine doesn't believe in it, but the move is pure Kamsky: a pawn sacrifice for piece play on the queenside, which may be a rarity in modern chess. One does see such ideas during a kingside attack, but how does it work here?! The answer lies on the black bishop at h7, which will remain a silent spectator through the game.
Having given up the pawn and controlling the a-file, Kamsky exchanges the queens too!
Once again, engines do not believe in White's play, but please do observe the clarity of thought. 24...b4 Somewhere around here, black doesn't find the best way to play. 24...Bg6 was a nice positional move, hoping to bring the bishop back into the game at some point, either with a future ...Nf6-d7 & f7-f6, or from h5 if the situation presents itself.
Black is still fine, but that is only if you employ engines to analyse the position! Imagine black being under pressure for about 20 long moves inching towards the time control: he finally cracks here. 35...Bxa5 36.Rxb8 Once again, white has an edge mainly due to the black bishop on g6, but it doesn't look anything serious 36...Bc3 37.Bxc3 Rxc3 38.Kf2 Rc7 39.g4 f6 40.Rd8 f5?
The proverbial 40th move howler - haven't you observed when most of the 'lashing out' pawn advances almost always turn out to be positional mistakes?! A typical 'freeing' push when your whole being screams for 'release' of tension. Black could have still sat still with his hands under his bottom, but not an easy thing to do over the board being under pressure 40...Re7. 41.Ke3 Someone's is coming to take over the central command! 41...Rf7 42.Rd6 fxg4 43.Bxg4 Bf5 44.Bxf5+ exf5 45.h4 Re7+ 46.Kf3 h5 47.Rxd5 g6 48.Re5 Rd7 1-0
A typical vintage Kamsky positional ‘squeeze’! This meant that Gata was now in striking distance to the top honours going into the last round.
One of the best efforts of the day came from Indian GM Shyam Sundar, who came up with spectacular play against a higher rated opponent, though the game became pretty messy with mutual mistakes towards the time control:
Shyam - Santos, round 8
15...Bc6?! Inexplicable! Black is not worse after allowing what he has just allowed, but there was no need to allow it at all in the first place! Black could have simply continued 15...Bg7 16.Nf3 Rc8 and with his central pawns, he even holds the better end of an equality. 16.Nxe6! Bam! There was no way any player could resist this. 16...fxe6 17.Qxe6+ Qe7 18.Qxg6+ Qf7 19.Qxf7+ Kxf7 20.f5 One of those positions where one should analyse WITH a chess engine! Though the position may be approximately, it is not at all easy to play with black pieces here
Black could have considered 24...Bf4 25.e6+ Kf6 26.Bxc5 d4! gives black the much needed counterplay and advantage.
30...Bh6? instead 30...Rac8 this tactical detail gives black an upper hand still. He threatens ...Bc6-b5 or ...Bc6-d7 here 31.Rd6 Rge8 (31...Bb5 32.Rf5) 32.Rf5 Rxe7 33.Rxh5+ Kg8 34.Rxc6 Re1+ 35.Kf2 Rxc6 36.Kxe1 Rxc5 with an edge for Black - he has an extra piece, after all.
In the game White played 36.Re5?! instead 36.h4! Bxh4 37.Re5 Kg7 38.Rxh5 Bxe7 39.Rxg8+ Rxg8 40.Bxe7 and white is a pawn ahead
36...Kg6?? The proverbial blunder approaching time pressure. But more than anything, Black was under pressure for so long! 37.g3?? Reciprocation! [37.e8Q+ Rxe8 38.Rexe8 Rxf8 39.Rxf8+-]
43...Bc1 44.Re5+- The point is that, g3 is not hanging and it is not possible to defend h5.
Round 9
Thus, it looked like a mouthwatering last round was on the cards, as Tabatabaei was on sole lead with 6.5/7, with six of them following close behind at 6.0/7, only to see a damp squib in the last round as the top three boards ended in quickly agreed draws :(
This left Shyam Sundar a chance to tie for the first with Tabatabaei on the top with a win, but he ran into a Xiong specialty:
Xiong - Shyam, round 9
11.Na3 After an eccentric opening, things seem to have settled down, but Shyam handles the development not in an ideal way. 11...Qe6?! [11...Ne7 12.Nc4 Qc5 13.Be3 Qb4 +=]
15...h5? 16.Ncxe5! Bam! Try to work out the variations here - it's fun! 16...Nxe5 17.Bc3! Excellently calculated. The positional factors which makes this tactic works are: 1) Black's Bishop at c5 [Remember Nunn's 'Loose Pieces Drop Off?'] 2) Black's pawn at c6 which will open the doors for the black king and 3) King in the centre (of course, the basic stuff)
Thus, Tabatabaei went on to win the tournament sole at 7.0/9.
Indians at a glance:
Addendum:
The tournament also produced two International Master norms, for Jianwen Wong of Malaysia and 12-year old Pranav Anand of Bangalore, India. This is Pranav’s second IM-Norm, the first one coming from the Rilton Cup 2018-19. While Wong had a short draw with GM Vishnu Prasanna in the final round, Pranav Anand defeated veteran IM Anatoly Donchenko (2249) of Germany.
Final Standings
| Rk. | SNo | Name | FED | Rtg | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | |
| 1 | 10 | GM | Tabatabaei M.amin | IRI | 2601 | 7,0 | 47,5 | 355,0 |
| 2 | 3 | GM | Kamsky Gata | USA | 2673 | 6,5 | 49,0 | 358,5 |
| 8 | GM | Donchenko Alexander | GER | 2615 | 6,5 | 49,0 | 358,5 | |
| 4 | 19 | GM | Brkic Ante | CRO | 2573 | 6,5 | 48,0 | 359,5 |
| 5 | 1 | GM | Xiong Jeffery | USA | 2691 | 6,5 | 48,0 | 353,5 |
| 6 | 13 | GM | Petrosyan Manuel | ARM | 2592 | 6,5 | 46,5 | 361,0 |
| 7 | 6 | GM | Iturrizaga Bonelli Eduardo | VEN | 2625 | 6,5 | 46,5 | 348,0 |
| 8 | 4 | GM | Salem A.R. Saleh | UAE | 2672 | 6,5 | 46,0 | 351,5 |
| 9 | 22 | GM | Puranik Abhimanyu | IND | 2550 | 6,5 | 44,5 | 365,5 |
| 10 | 18 | GM | Moussard Jules | FRA | 2576 | 6,5 | 42,0 | 351,5 |
| 11 | 26 | GM | Shchekachev Andrei | FRA | 2531 | 6,5 | 42,0 | 343,5 |
| 12 | 5 | GM | Jumabayev Rinat | KAZ | 2633 | 6,0 | 45,5 | 334,5 |
| 13 | 11 | GM | Gopal G.N. | IND | 2594 | 6,0 | 45,0 | 342,0 |
| 14 | 30 | GM | Mastrovasilis Athanasios | GRE | 2518 | 6,0 | 44,5 | 348,5 |
| 15 | 31 | IM | Keymer Vincent | GER | 2513 | 6,0 | 44,0 | 353,0 |
| 16 | 12 | GM | Santos Latasa Jaime | ESP | 2594 | 6,0 | 44,0 | 349,0 |
| 17 | 25 | GM | Erigaisi Arjun | IND | 2531 | 6,0 | 43,5 | 357,0 |
| 18 | 29 | GM | Shyam Sundar M. | IND | 2520 | 6,0 | 42,0 | 347,0 |
| 19 | 21 | GM | Aryan Chopra | IND | 2553 | 6,0 | 42,0 | 345,5 |
| 20 | 14 | GM | Vaibhav Suri | IND | 2591 | 6,0 | 41,5 | 344,5 |
About the Author
Saravanan Venkatachalam is an International Master and has been an active chess player in the Indian circuit, and has been consistently writing on chess since late 1980s. He turned complete chess professional in 2012, actively playing and being a second and a trainer to a handful of Indian players. He reports on chess tournaments, occasionally being a correspondent to national newspapers and news channels. Apart from chess, he is also interested in Tamil and English literature, music and photography.
The article has been edited by Shahid Ahmed
