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Good day everyone, welcome to the Chessdom live coverage of Biel Grandmaster Tournament 2008. Magnus Carlsen won the last year's event after a tiebreak match with Alexander Onischuk, but Yannick Pelletier had a good tournament and beat Carlsen with Black. Perhaps we get to see this Nimzo-Indian again :) Enjoy the game.
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3!? This time, Carlsen is avoiding the Nimzo-Indian.
3... b6 Black can choose between a variety of defenses, 3...c5 for Benoni or Bluemenfeld, 3...d5 for Queen's Gambit Declined or 3...Bb4+ for Bogo-Indian. Of course, other transpositions are possible as well. Pelletier wants to play Queen's Indian defence.
4.g3 ( Tigran Petrosian invented the waiting and useful 4.a3 which Garry Kasparov perfected later.)
4... Ba6 5.Qc2!? A modern way of dealing with Black's maneuver Ba6-b7 where White is trying not to push b3 and prepares to sacrifice a pawn instead. Aronian, Radjabov, Gelfand and Kramnik all tried this line.
5... Bb7 6.Bg2 c5 7.d5 exd5 8.cxd5 Nxd5 ( The other way to take the pawn is 8... Bxd5 but then White grabs some tempi for development, for example 9.Nc3 Bc6 10.e4 d6 11.Bf4)
9.O-O Be7 10.Rd1 Nc6 ( Carlsen himself played 10... Qc8 against Peter Svidler recently.)
11.Qf5 Nf6 12.e4 The most consistent follow-up after the aggressive Qf5. (12.Nc3 has been tried in one game, but it appears too slow 12... O-O 13.e4 g6 14.Qf4 d6 and your commentator IM Miodrag Perunovic won this game with Black :))
12... d6 ( More common is 12... g6 and now the game Carlsen-Ivanchuk 2007 continued 13.Qf4 O-O 14.e5 Nh5 15.Qg4 d5 16.exd6 Bf6 17.Nc3 Nd4 18.Nxd4 Bxg2 19.Nf5! , White eventually won.)
13.e5 Qd7 This plan of dealing with White Queen has been tried only once, in Bareev-J.Polgar in the last year's Candidate matches. Bareev convincingly won, but Peletier probably has some improvement up in his sleeve.
14.Qxd7+ Nxd7 15.exd6 Bf6 16.Re1+ Kf8 17.Nc3 Black is usually giving the extra pawn back, in order to finish the development without harm. After a short forced sequence, material is equal and White d6 pawn is deep inside the enemy territory. As long as Black can't attack it successfully, it goes into White's advantage because it is seriously limiting Black's mobility. Pelletier still has to connect his Rooks.
17... Nb4 18.Bg5!? GM Krasenkow criticized this move in his annotations and suggested 18. Rd1 with "plus/equal advantage to White". Carlsen might find the Rook move to be too slow and suggests exchange sacrifice.
18... Nc2!? Pelletier accepts the challenge! White can continue with 19. Bxf6 Nxf6 20. Re7 or sacrifice an exchange with immediate 19. Re7!? ( Judit Polgar played 18... Bxf3 19.Bxf3 Rd8 20.Bxf6 Nxf6 21.Re7 but it ended bad after White's Rook invaded the 7th rank.)
19.Re7! A daring exchange sacrifice, perfectly fitting with Carlsen's aggressive playing profile. ( Krasenkow gave the following line 19.Bxf6 Nxf6 20.Re7 Bxf3 21.Bxf3 Re8 22.Rxe8+ Kxe8 but White will have serious problems to keep the d6 pawn.) An important question is how will White recapture should Black take on e7 (which seems like the only move). If 20. Bxe7+ then Black King will be strained on g8, but White d6 pawn is still blocked by the Nd7 and it is unclear if White can unlock it. 20. dxe7+ brings pawn one step closer to the promoting square, but the main question is if Black will have time to close the d-file with Bxf3 and Nd4. Very interesting position :)
19... Bxf3!? ( Pelletier sidesteps the most challenging 19... Bxe7 20.Bxe7+ Kg8 21.Rd1 with possible ideas of Ne5 and Nb5.)
20.Bxf3 The tempo on Ra8 allows White to trade on f6 and keep the Rook on the 7th rank. This now resembles Bareev-Polgar and White is probably better.
20... Bxg5 ( Actually, on 20... Rd8 21.Bd5 is devastating (21.Bxf6 Nxf6 would be like Bareev game...))
21.Rxd7 Rd8 22.Rxd8+ Bxd8 23.Rd1 Carlsen now enjoys stable advantage because Black pieces are poorly coordinated. Light-squared Bishop will prevent the blockade on d7 and d6 pawn will limit Black Bishop. Nb5 is also in the air...
23... Nd4 24.Bg2!? Nd4 is preventing possible Bc6+, but if Black attempts to play Ke8, White can insert Nb5.
24... h5! Rook has to find a road to enter the play.
25.a4 a6 26.Bb7 Rh6! Of course, Pelletier would love to trade a6 for d6. Perhaps 24. Bg2 was played a bit too quick. It is understandable that Carlsen wanted to keep the opposite-coloured Bishops on the board, but with hindsight, 24. Kg2 looked better. In that case, Bishop from f3 is eyeing h5 pawn.
27.d7 Rd6 28.Bc8 (28.Bxa6 Rxd7 29.Kg2 White eventually has to move his King and prevent all kind of tactics...)
28... Nf3+ This motif, while King is on g1, allows Black to trade off the Rooks and reduce the pressure.
29.Kg2 Rxd1 30.Nxd1 Ne1+ 31.Kf1 Nf3 32.h4 Ke7 33.Ne3 It looks like a6 might be eventually traded for d7 and then Black will be able to hold. 33...g6 and 33...Nd4 are good.
33... g6 34.Bxa6 Kxd7 35.Ke2 Ne5!? (35... Nd4+!? with Bf6 next)
36.f4 Ng4 Pelletier is aiming for an opposite-coloured Bishops ending...With no other pieces on the board, it is an easy draw. Carlsen will probably avoid it :)
37.Bb5+ Ke7 38.Nd5+ Kd6 39.Bc4 Nh6! Pelletier is accurate in spite of being in slight time trouble. After the possible Nf5, White weak pawn also comes under attack...
40.Ne3 Bf6 41.Bd3 Bd8 42.Kf3 Maybe White will be able to push f4-f5 at the convenient moment and after gxf5 recapture with the Bishop, offering N vs B ending.
42... Ng4!? 43.Nxg4 ( If White avoids the trade with 43.Nc4+ Kd5 then f4-f5 is not possible because of contact between Kd5 and Nc4.)
43... hxg4+ 44.Kxg4 Ke6 45.Bc4+ Ke7 46.Kf3 f5 47.Ke2 Kf8 48.Kd3 Bf6 49.b3 Bb2-c1-d2 looks like a timely maneuver to counter possible White's Kb5.
49... Bb2! 50.Bd5 Ba3 51.Kc4 Bb4 52.Kb5 Ba5 53.Bc4 (53.b4!? cxb4 54.Bb3 is a very interesting attempt to create zugzwang, but Black can probably hold with timely b6-b5 (when White King is on e5 or similar) and then Bb6-Bf2-Bxg3-Bxf4 when Bishop is controlling promotion square b8.)
53... Ke7 54.Kc6 Kf6 55.Bd3 Kf7?! (55... Ke6 looks safer because the King is still with f5-pawn. If 56. g4, Black should be able to use the passed g-pawn as decoy and contain White pawns.)
56.h5! gxh5 57.Bxf5 Now White has excellent winning chances because h5 is very weak.
57... Kf6 58.Be4! King will be tied for h5-pawn.
58... Kg7 59.Bf3 Kh6 60.Kb5! Kg6 61.Bd1 Kh6 62.Be2 Kg6 63.Bf3 Kh6 64.Bc6! Final finesse! Now Black will be brought into zugzwang after Be8-f7 and lose the h5-pawn. With the Bishop unfortunately locked on a5, the resulting endgame is winning for White - Pelletier realized this and threw the towel. After Black's mistake on 55th move, Carlsen used the opportunity to win the first round of Biel International! It will be interesting to analyze the position after 53. b4!?, maybe this was winning as well. Thank you everyone for following Chessdom live commentary, have a nice day.
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