Chess
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Your support makes all the difference.ON TUESDAY, I reported on the triumph of age in the Dutch multimillionaire Joop van Oosterom's eighth annual contest between Veterans and Ladies - the Flamenco tournament in Marbella.
Already condemned to defeat with a round to spare, the Ladies made no great effort with their Whites in the final round on Monday and all five games were drawn, leaving the final score 30.5-19.5. A staggering margin, even though the Ladies were slightly outgraded, especially considering the history of the contest, which was tied at three wins apiece and one draw before the Flamenco, with the veterans holding a minuscule lead of 219.5 - 218.5 in terms of game points.
The turnaround is surely due in no small measure to this year's and last's top scorer, Victor Lvovich Korchnoi, now 68 - he was born on 23 March 1931: but still 16th in the world with a rating of 2,676.
Never one to make concessions either to his opponents or himself, Korchnoi finally consented to play as a Veteran only last year, at the Can Can tournament in Monaco where he made 9/12. He also made 75 per cent this time - 7.5/10 - with six wins, three draws including an 149-move effort against Maia Chiburdanidze in which he spent the last 103 moves (!) trying to win with rook and knight against a rook, initially with one pawn and later by itself; and just a single loss to Xie Jun.
Three of the other four men also made a plus score - Hort and Portisch on 6.5/10 and Spassky on 5.5; but 78-year-old Vassily Smyslov did make less than 50 per cent as, rather traumatically, did all the women. The scores were: Chiburdanidze, Smyslov and Xie Jun 4.5; Cramling and Zhe Chen 4; Galliamova just 2.5.
Korchnoi's revenge against Xie Jun was with his favourite line against the King's Indian. Somehow, when Kasparov is Black this always seems to turn into a huge melee but Korchnoi is able to keep control against almost anybody else and although Xie Jun got some threats and he had to be careful - not, for example, 42 Nxb6? when Bf4! is really strong - in the end his queenside attack crashed through.
White: Victor Korchnoi
Black: Xie Jun
King's Indian Defence
1 d4 Nf6
2 c4 g6
3 Nc3 Bg7
4 e4 d6
5 Be2 0-0
6 Nf3 e5
7 0-0 Nc6
8 d5 Ne7
9 Ne1 Nd7
10 Be3 f5
11 f3 f4
12 Bf2 g5
13 b4 Nf6
14 c5 Ng6
15 a4 h5
16 c6 Bh6
17 b5 b6
18 a5 g4
19 axb6 cxb6
20 fxg4 hxg4
21 g3 Rf7
22 Bd3 Nh7
23 Kh1 Ng5
24 Ra2 Qc7
25 Be2 Nh3
26 gxf4 Rxf4
27 Bg3 Rxf1+
28 Bxf1 Ngf4
29 Nd3 Qf7
30 Nf2 Qg6
31 Be2 Kh8
32 Qf1 Qg5
33 Bd1 Nh5
34 Nxh3 Nxg3+
35 hxg3 gxh3
36 Qf3 a6
37 Kh2 Kg8
38 Be2 a5
39 Bd1 Ra7
40 Rf2 Rg7
41 Na4 Qg6
42 Rf1 Bf4
43 gxf4 exf4
44 Be2 Qg2+
45 Qxg2 Rxg2+
46 Kh1 Rxe2
47 Nxb6 Bg4
48 Rg1 f3
49 Rxg4+ Kh7
50 c7 f2
51 Rf4
1-0
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