Obiettivo Risarcimento, Nona Win European Club Cup
For the first time Obiettivo Risarcimento from Padova, Italy, won the gold medals at the European Club Cup. Nona (Georgia) won in the women's section for the fourth time.
The European Club Cup, a seven-round competition for European club teams, finished on Saturday in Ulcinj, Montenegro. The first four rounds of this event are covered here.
Open
After four rounds, four teams had won all their matches: reigning champion Mednyi Vsadnik (St. Petersburg), club Vugar Gashimov from Azerbaijan, Obiettivo Risarcimento from Padova and SK Joly Lysa nad Labem from the Czech Republic.
This year the Italian club dominated the competition as it won its remaining three matches as well—against club Vugar Gashimov, then Mednyi Vsadnik and then also against the top seeds of the competition, Alkaloid from North Macedonia and the winners in 2016.
Against a team of seasoned grandmasters, the Azerbaijanis with three IMs couldn't compete:
| Bo. | Fed | 4 | Obiettivo Risarcimento Padova | Rtg | 4 : 2 | Fed | 13 | Vugar Gashimov | Rtg |
| 1.1 | GM | Rapport, Richard | 2752 | ½ - ½ | GM | Mamedov, Rauf | 2648 | ||
| 1.2 | GM | Adams, Michael | 2692 | ½ - ½ | GM | Asadli, Vugar | 2513 | ||
| 1.3 | GM | Leko, Peter | 2666 | 1 - 0 | GM | Sadikhov, Ulvi | 2502 | ||
| 1.4 | GM | Jones, Gawain C B | 2663 | 1 - 0 | IM | Buksa, Nataliya | 2410 | ||
| 1.5 | GM | Saric, Ivan | 2650 | 1 - 0 | IM | Suleymanli, Aydin | 2429 | ||
| 1.6 | GM | Brunello, Sabino | 2549 | 0 - 1 | IM | Ahmadzada, Ahmad | 2406 |
This match saw a tremendously wild game between 2018 European Champion Ivan Saric of Croatia and 14-year-old IM Aydin Suleymanli of Azerbaijan. On move 51, the material imbalance was as follows: bishop, knight and six pawns vs. two rooks, a bishop and pawn! However, one of the black rooks was trapped on h8 and would remain so until the end of the game:
In the final rounds the team from Padova got better opposition but emerged victoriously anyway. On Friday the reigning champions were toppled:
| Bo. | Fed | 2 | Mednyi Vsadnik | Rtg | 2 : 4 | Fed | 4 | Obiettivo Risarcimento Padova | Rtg |
| 1.1 | GM | Dominguez Perez, Leinier | 2762 | ½ - ½ | GM | Rapport, Richard | 2752 | ||
| 1.2 | GM | Matlakov, Maxim | 2710 | ½ - ½ | GM | Adams, Michael | 2692 | ||
| 1.3 | GM | Alekseenko, Kirill | 2715 | 0 - 1 | GM | Leko, Peter | 2666 | ||
| 1.4 | GM | Fedoseev, Vladimir | 2672 | ½ - ½ | GM | Vallejo Pons, Francisco | 2694 | ||
| 1.5 | GM | Rodshtein, Maxim | 2653 | 0 - 1 | GM | Jones, Gawain C B | 2663 | ||
| 1.6 | GM | Ponkratov, Pavel | 2619 | ½ - ½ | GM | Saric, Ivan | 2650 |
In this match the top three boards all had the same opening, the o-so topical Giuoco Pianissimo. Former world championship contender Peter Leko showed that, although he's less active these days, his repertoire is still top notch. He outplayed Russia's rising star Kirill Alekseenko on the kingside:
Gawain Jones of England won the gold medal for his performance on board five, where he scored an undefeated 5/6, good for a 2809 performance. In this match playing a Gruenfeld, he defeated Israeli grandmaster Maxim Rodshtein.
It seems both players were told by their captains not to repeat moves around the time control. Later the game seemed to be heading to a draw anyway until Rodshtein erred:
Congratulations @GMGawain , well done on a great performance! I think you might be getting more blacks in team events in the future! Hehe. So proud of you and I love you! pic.twitter.com/GQNWglqevp
— Sue Maroroa (@WIM_Maroroa) November 16, 2019
It was slightly ironic that in the final round, this strong team from Italy full of foreign grandmasters beat their (also international!) opponents on the last board, where it was the only Italian player who won his game.
| Bo. | Fed | 4 | Obiettivo Risarcimento Padova | Rtg | 3½:2½ | Fed | 1 | Alkaloid | Rtg |
| 1.1 | GM | Rapport, Richard | 2752 | ½ - ½ | GM | Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar | 2772 | ||
| 1.2 | GM | Adams, Michael | 2692 | ½ - ½ | GM | Andreikin, Dmitry | 2733 | ||
| 1.3 | GM | Leko, Peter | 2666 | ½ - ½ | GM | Shankland, Sam | 2679 | ||
| 1.4 | GM | Jones, Gawain C B | 2663 | ½ - ½ | GM | Inarkiev, Ernesto | 2665 | ||
| 1.5 | GM | Saric, Ivan | 2650 | ½ - ½ | GM | Kryvoruchko, Yuriy | 2683 | ||
| 1.6 | GM | Vocaturo, Daniele | 2615 | 1 - 0 | GM | Kovalev, Vladislav | 2674 |
Daniele Vocaturo beat Vladislav Kovalev of Belarus with the black pieces in a Tarrasch French. It seems the white player wasn't aware of the recent Ganguly-Peralta game, where White also got into trouble:
2019 European Club Cup | Final Standings (Top 10)
| Rk. | SNo | Fed | Team | + | = | - | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | TB4 | TB5 |
| 1 | 4 | Obiettivo Risarcimento Padova | 7 | 0 | 0 | 14 | 237,0 | 30,5 | 174,5 | 174,5 | |
| 2 | 3 | AVE Novy Bor | 6 | 0 | 1 | 12 | 214,5 | 28,5 | 176,0 | 149,0 | |
| 3 | 2 | Mednyi Vsadnik | 5 | 1 | 1 | 11 | 225,5 | 27,0 | 182,5 | 140,3 | |
| 4 | 1 | Alkaloid | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 237,5 | 30,5 | 161,5 | 104,0 | |
| 5 | 7 | Moscow Chess Team | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 221,5 | 29,5 | 165,5 | 113,5 | |
| 6 | 8 | Valerenga | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 218,0 | 28,0 | 170,0 | 112,0 | |
| 7 | 6 | Molodezka | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 204,0 | 26,5 | 172,0 | 119,0 | |
| 8 | 13 | Vugar Gashimov | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 194,0 | 26,0 | 169,5 | 110,5 | |
| 9 | 10 | Koge SK | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 184,0 | 28,0 | 164,0 | 107,0 | |
| 10 | 5 | Primorsky District | 5 | 0 | 2 | 10 | 182,5 | 27,0 | 161,5 | 108,5 |
(Full final standings here.)
Women
In the women's group, the two top seeds—Cercle d'Echecs Monte Carlo and the Kyiv Chess Federation—were leading after four rounds with seven match points. They had already played each other (and tied 2-2).
Chess club Nona from Georgia was one point behind, having started its first two rounds with 2-2 as well. Then Nona was warmed up and defeated both Monte Carlo and Kiev, after which another 2-2, with the team from St. Petersburg, was enough to stay ahead of their rivals.
| Bo. | Fed | 2 | Cercle d'Echecs Monte Carlo | Rtg | 1 : 3 | Fed | 3 | Nona | Rtg |
| 1.1 | GM | Koneru, Humpy | 2577 | 1 - 0 | GM | Dzagnidze, Nana | 2502 | ||
| 1.2 | GM | Cramling, Pia | 2443 | 0 - 1 | IM | Javakhishvili, Lela | 2457 | ||
| 1.3 | GM | Socko, Monika | 2417 | 0 - 1 | GM | Batsiashvili, Nino | 2422 | ||
| 1.4 | IM | Daulyte-Cornette, Deimante | 2405 | 0 - 1 | GM | Khotenashvili, Bela | 2446 |
Nino Batsiashvili played a lovely attacking game in this match:
The next day the two Muzychuk sisters were held to draws, and on boards three and four the two GMs beat the two IMs.
| Bo. | Fed | 3 | Nona | Rtg | 3 : 1 | Fed | 1 | Kyiv Chess Federation | Rtg |
| 1.1 | GM | Dzagnidze, Nana | 2502 | ½ - ½ | GM | Muzychuk, Mariya | 2552 | ||
| 1.2 | IM | Javakhishvili, Lela | 2457 | ½ - ½ | GM | Muzychuk, Anna | 2543 | ||
| 1.3 | GM | Batsiashvili, Nino | 2422 | 1 - 0 | IM | Abdumalik, Zhansaya | 2472 | ||
| 1.4 | GM | Khotenashvili, Bela | 2446 | 1 - 0 | IM | Osmak, Iulija | 2401 |
Nona won for the fourth time, and it surely helped that it was once again playing with basically the national team of Georgia. However, at the recent European Team Championship in Batumi, Batsiashvili wasn't on the team as she had decided to play in the FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss earlier.
As her brother pointed out in a tweet, Batsiashvili took revenge over the board, scoring a gold medal on board three with 4.5/6 and a 2603 performance.
Nino gets double gold with performance 2603 in Montenegro right after she was kicked out from the Georgian national team! https://t.co/okDlpnkbPr pic.twitter.com/R5Z5gHhzxa
— Batsiashvili Davit (@Batsiashvili1) November 16, 2019
2019 European Club Cup (Women) | Final Standings
| Rk. | SNo | Fed | Team | x | x | - | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 | TB4 | TB5 |
| 1 | 3 | Nona | 4 | 3 | 0 | 11 | 130,0 | 17,5 | 113,0 | 88,0 | |
| 2 | 1 | Kyiv Chess Federation | 4 | 2 | 1 | 10 | 118,0 | 16,5 | 117,0 | 82,8 | |
| 3 | 2 | Cercle d`Echecs Monte Carlo | 4 | 2 | 1 | 10 | 110,5 | 16,0 | 113,5 | 79,0 | |
| 4 | 6 | Odlar Yurdu | 3 | 3 | 1 | 9 | 114,0 | 17,5 | 105,0 | 63,0 | |
| 5 | 4 | Ugra | 4 | 0 | 3 | 8 | 97,5 | 16,0 | 105,5 | 55,5 | |
| 6 | 7 | AVE Novy Bor | 3 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 92,0 | 17,5 | 90,5 | 41,5 | |
| 7 | 8 | SPB Chess and Draughts Sport School | 3 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 87,0 | 18,0 | 82,5 | 35,3 | |
| 8 | 10 | ZSK Maribor | 3 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 75,5 | 14,5 | 95,0 | 44,0 | |
| 9 | 5 | Caissa Pentole Agnelli | 3 | 1 | 3 | 7 | 82,0 | 14,5 | 98,0 | 40,8 | |
| 10 | 9 | Jelica PEP | 3 | 0 | 4 | 6 | 67,5 | 14,0 | 93,5 | 29,5 | |
| 11 | 11 | Gambit Asseco SEE | 2 | 2 | 3 | 6 | 61,5 | 15,0 | 81,5 | 23,5 | |
| 12 | 13 | Rishon Lezion | 2 | 1 | 4 | 5 | 27,0 | 9,0 | 90,5 | 17,5 | |
| 13 | 14 | Hertzeliya Chess Club | 1 | 0 | 6 | 2 | 19,5 | 5,5 | 92,5 | 4,5 | |
| 14 | 12 | Woman Chess | 0 | 0 | 7 | 0 | 19,0 | 4,5 | 94,0 | 0,0 |
Games via TWIC.
European #Chess Club Cup 2019 concluded yesterday!
— European Chess Union (@ECUonline) November 17, 2019
The Winners #ECCC2019 :
🏆 Obiettivo Risarcimento Padova🇮🇹
🥈 AVE Novy Bor🇨🇿
🥉 Mednyi Vsadnik🇷🇺
The Winners #EWCCC2019:
🏆 Batumi Chess Club Nona🇬🇪
🥈 Kyiv Chess Federation🇺🇦
🥉Cercle d'Echecs Monte Carlo🇲🇨
Congratulations! pic.twitter.com/g3nymW41JK
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Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
Peter's first book The Chess Revolution is out now!
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