Tsjizjow - Georgiev 2003

In March 2003 a match for the world championship took place between the title defender Alexei Tsjizjow and challenger Alexander Georgiev. The match was held in Izhevsk and Ufa, and consisted of 5 sets of 3 games.

In the second game of the first set Georgiev surprised everybody by playing a KVO right from the opening. On this level that is a very dangerous undertaking, which is illustrated by the position after 32 moves. Black is clearly under pressure. In this position Tsjizjow exchanged with 33.27-22 18x27 34.29-23 19x28 35.33x31, after which Georgiew managed to make a draw rather easily. I wonder what would have happened after the attack ≡ 33.29-24 20x29 34.33x24 19x30 35.35x24. Both after 3-9 36.24-20 and after ≡ 18-23 36.39-34! 23-28 37.32x23 21x43 38.48x39 the white position looks extremely good to me.

The third game was even more spectacular. In this position Georgiev played the incredible move 27.35-30!? After this the position becomes extremely complicated. Despite this, both players find the strongest moves. 17-21 28.26x17 12x21 29.31-26 27-32 30.26x17 32x41 Here Schwarzman proposes the interesting idea 31.42-37 41x32 32.43-38 32x43 33.49x38 22-27 34.33x31 11x22 35.38-32 The position seem equal then, for example 8-12 36.31-27 22x31 37.36x27 12-17 38.47-41 6-11 39.41-36 17-22 40.39-33 22x31 41.36x27 18-22 42.29x9 20x38 43.9x20 15x35 44.27x18 38x27 45.18-13 = The game continued with ≡ 31.36-31 41-46 32.24-19 13x35 33.31-27 22x31 34.33x2 11x22 35.29x36 14-19 36.2x30 35x24, see the next diagram.

Of course now only Tsjizjow may hope to win the game. But Georgiev stays cool and secures the draw in a convincing manner. 37.39-33 24-29 38.34x23 46x19 39.43-38 19-46 Because after ≡ 19-8 white can advance with 40.33-28 and black has difficulties stopping this piece. ≡ 40.36-31 6-11 41.31-27 25-30 42.33-29 46-28 43.38-33 28x39 44.29-23 30-35 45.23-18 39-30 46.49-43 30-19 47.18-12 11-17 48.12x21 19-28 49.42-37 28x46 50.21-17 46-23 51.47-41 23x46 52.17-12 46-14 53.12-7 14-9 54.7-1 9x36 55.1-6 36-27(?) 56.6-50! 27x49 57.48-42 and black must give a piece back with 35-40 58.45x34 which leads to a draw.

This classical position is obviously better for white because of the tempo difference (+4 for black) and the flexible position of the white pieces. That explains the agressive move 24-29. Instead of this, a normal development with ≡ 7-11, 13-18, 9-13 11-17 etc. would have been enough for a draw, although not easy. Georgiev proceeded strongly with ≡ 34.43-39! Now black has no better than 21-26 35.39-33 29x38 36.42x33 14-20 37.27-22! 12-18 38.30-25 18x29 39.25x3 23x41 40.47x36 19-24 with a difficult endgame for black, but still with good perspectives for a draw. In the game Tsjizjow played ≡ 12-18? and this move cost him the first set. Georgiev finished the game with a nice trick: 35.30-25 (creates the positional threat 39-33) ≡ 29-33 36.25-20! 33x31 37.37x17 14x25 38.32-28! 23x32 39.17-12 18-22 40.12x1 22-27 41.39-33 and Tsjizjow resigned.

© Wieger Wesselink https://10x10.org