English Chess Forum

Cannot for the life of me work out why here (So-Hovhannisyan): 3K1k2/4rp2/6p1/8/2PR4/3p4/8/8 b - - 7 53 53...Re2 draws but 53...Re1 wins. It must be a line somewhere where the Black pawn threatens to queen on d1 and the rook is protecting that square. Shouldn't think so. The win looks pretty trivia...

I had Lichess doing this in another game. The one where someone's rook was weirdly trapped in a corner and a Black pawn was trying to queen supported by a knight. Above, I was referring to Mahdavi-Sargissian from round 6: https://lichess.org/broadcast/46th-fide-chess-olympiad-samarkand-2026-open-ma...

Christopher Kreuzer wrote: ↑

Wed Sep 23, 2026 4:25 pm

Luke showing his team-mates how to win!

EDIT: Oops. As I wrote that he played f5+ and back to 0.00!

Luke has a safe win now. Just shows it could have been 2-2. Oh well.

I had Lichess doing this in another game. The one where someone's rook was weirdly trapped in a corner and a Black pawn was trying to queen supported by a knight.

Luke showing his team-mates how to win!

EDIT: Oops. As I wrote that he played f5+ and back to 0.00!

Cannot for the life of me work out why here (So-Hovhannisyan):

3K1k2/4rp2/6p1/8/2PR4/3p4/8/8 b - - 7 53

53...Re2 draws but 53...Re1 wins.

It must be a line somewhere where the Black pawn threatens to queen on d1 and the rook is protecting that square.

Am trying to think who else is good in wild games. Shreyas? Luke? Is a team best when you have people who can win wild games? I suspect the best teams (India, Uzbekistan - who soundly thrashed China today) are those who are strong and solid. Which can be difficult in chess!

Hi Keith, hope you're well I assume India are a bit surprised about who is on boards 3 and 4; Dan and Luke will have been expecting their opponents and prepared accordingly; fingers crossed I'm good thanks Mick. Can Dan save this for England after the Russian lost on board one ?.... I apologise if ...

Meanwhile Dan fights back from -6. He is the bees knees in crazy situations like these! Sadly not. And the final slip (Qc2 instead of Qc4+) is not that difficult to calculate. I would not expect to find it myself, but some GMs (and lower) would find that. Maybe Daniel already thought the position w...

So difficult to play those positions.

Apparently, Daniel's position is level again... One of those positions where the online audience have to accept the GMs also don't really know what to do. (Though hopefully in this case Daniel has clocked the drawing plan of check from behind, win the b-pawn and create enough threats with the passed...

It has gone slightly south. Looking like 3-1 to India. Maybe just accept we lost to a better team and move on. Agreed that those commenting should be consistent about how to refer to Nikita (and others over the years who have adopted or played under the England flag). The team is England. No need fo...

I take it the Shohradovas are related? Adams' win was excellent. It helped that his opponent played to his strengths. Non critical openings such as the London, where there is a choice of reasonable set ups are the worst things to play against him with White - he can come up with something quite dif...

A player who scores 5/7 by competing exclusively on top boards against the highest-rated seeds has accomplished something substantially more difficult than a player who scores 5/7 by playing catch-up against the lower half of the field. So, to change this slightly: "A player who scores 5/7 by compe...

Sadly, your tiebreak does not help when someone swimming at the "deep end" (as you put it) is leapfrogged in the last round by someone who has played weaker opposition but ends up scoring more points. It is a nice idea though. You might want to look into how complicated tiebreak systems have succeed...