Despite eleven players starting the 7th round in first place, only one remained after it! Kazak GM Alisher Suleymenov gave himself good chances by defeating Turkish GM Vahap Sanal. A big pack is chasing though and breathing down his neck half a point behind, no fewer than 17 players are tied for 2nd place!
Maze and Deac never seemed to threaten each other enough for things to happen and same on board 2 in the game between Moussard,and former tournament winner Adhiban. Draws in Paulius vs Seemann and Praveen vs Emre Can as well as Guðmundur Kjartansson drawing Ivanchuk meant that Suleymenov was the only player of the top 11 to win his game!
Sulemenov’s main claim to fame is perhaps his win against Carlsen last year
Against Sanal he had aggressive intentions early! First he preserved his bishop pair and especially his potentially strong light squared bishop. Then he started complications.
12.d5!? exd5 13.Nd4 indicated that he wanted a fight! Sanal got a small chance on move 21 but missed it.
Instead Suleymenov kept up the pressure with an exchange sacrifice 23.Re4+!? with some initiative. Black was probably objectively fine but after 30…Qg7?? the Queenside pawns started to drop off like flies and the result wasn’t in doubt when the Kazak had FIVE pawns for the exchange lost!
Guðmundur Kjartansson was the local hope in the leader pack and he remains in with a chance after drawing against Ivanchuk. “Gummi” as he’s called found a nice perpetual to end the game instead of risking anything.
29.c5! var nice and after 29…Rxc5 30.d7+ Kd8 he played 31.Re1 and black’s only defence is 31…He5 to stop Re8 but then white just switches to the c-file with the same threat, rinse and repeat!
Their opening closely resembled Ivkov against Icelandic legend Friðrik Olafsson back in 1971. Olafsson still pays close attention to chess tournaments and he gave the president of the ICF a call and mentioned the resemblance to his game as he was following it online!
Another local legend, GM Johann Hjartarson found a nice way to finish his game.
26…Bxg5!! gets the popular brilliant move !! from the computers after 27.fxg5 there followed 27…Rxd4 and then the rook swung back to g4 with threats too strong to survive.
IM Bjorn Thorfinnsson in many ways stole the thunder in today’s round. Bjorn sacrificed a pawn in the opening vs what looked like somewhat dubious opening play by his opponent. In the early middlegame Bjorn found an ingenious way to trade pieces
22.Rce1!! came like a bolt from the blue. At first it was though it was a DGT error but it wasn’t. In fact it was a brilliant move and computer approved with the !!
The idea is to dominate the black pieces and only give the black square bishop the b8 square to retreat. Bjorn managed that task and kept the bind for the rest of the game!
Peter Heine Nielsen, longtime assistant of Magnus Carlsen, was impressed by the idea!
Wow! very cool, never seen such before.
— Peter Heine Nielsen (@PHChess) March 19, 2024
Bjorn remarked that his opponent had went on the Golden Circle tour but later that day he got shown the Golden Domination!
Analysis by The Chess Viking:
The young talent Bodhana Sivanandan was on the DGT boards and played a long game against a French IM. The young English talent has remarkable poise and concentration at the board and seems destined for great things!
Bodhana was fighting hard the whole game but defended remarkably well but in time trouble she missed a golden opportunity!
Here Bodhana played 54.Qa4?? and we get an endgame that black should win. Instead 54.Nd5+! mates in two since 54…Qxd5 55.Qa4# and 54…Kb5 55.Qa4# end the game!
This would have been Bodhana’s first IM scalp but I don’t think we’ll have to wait too long!
7th round results.
Suleymanov has half a point on the big chasing pack. 17 players chase him with three U16 players and young Chinese talent Lu Miaoyi living up to the hype!
Here standings in various Category prizes can be seen.
PICTURES from the 7th round (Hallfridur Sigurdardottir)
In the penultimate round Chinese #3 seed Xiangyu Xu gets white against Suleymanov.
Games with 15-minute delay can be observed here:
This year there is a record number of streamers with a total of 8 players streaming their games live.
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- Anna Cramling streams on Twitch and Youtube with Pia Cramling commentary.
- The Botez sistersAlexandra og Andrea are also live on Twitch and on Youtube with Jon Ludvig Hammer providing commentary.
- WGM Dina Belenkaya is onTwitch and on Youtube with Ben Finegold commenting
- Zachary Saine „The Chessnerd“ is onTwitch
- Tallulah Roberts „Lularobs“ is o Twitch
- Anna-Maja Kazarian is on Twitch and on Youtube
- Alexandra Prado is on Twitch
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