The Chess Mind

There weren't any whiz-bang games, but all the games were long and decisive. Both the locals - Topalov and Cheparinov - won, and they were joined in the winner's circle by Ivanchuk.

Radjabov - Ivanchuk was a balanced game most of the way, with Radjabov having a slight edge at a few points, but the decision to play 31.Rd5 was self-destructive. Maybe he wasn't losing there, but the trend was negative and by move 38 at the latest he was lost.

Aronian - Topalov started without any problems for White, but Topalov's play offered a nice demonstration of "Capablanca's Rule", that queen and knight typically work better together than queen and bishop.* Topalov's 36th move was especially interesting: a brilliant rook sacrifice initiating an 11-move combination resulting in a winning knight vs. bishop ending. It was a very nice idea, but it has to be said that it was an error - see the game page for details.

Finally, Cheparinov - Bu Xiangzhi was a nice case of light-squared domination by White. Especially instructive was Black's mistaken decision to open the position up with 26...g6 and 27...f5. Black possibly hoped to achieve counterplay with the break, but it didn't really happen. Worse, White's knight was able to reach f5, with great effect.

For round 2, these are the pairings:

Topalov - Ivanchuk
Bu Xiangzhi - Radjabov
Aronian - Cheparinov

Links and videos here; the games with my comments here.

* Whether this really deserves the status of "rule" is disputable - I believe John Watson has called this into question in Secrets of Modern Strategy. Still, while there are always loads of exceptions to such rules of thumb, there's enough to it that it deserves consideration.