Corus starts tomorrow Short in group A Howell in group B.

[Paul McKeown]

Missed the obvious Rf8 (embarrassing), sort of saved Short at the cost of a shattered kingside, but he's now like that knight without arms and legs still not yielding, pawn down, no counterplay, facing connected passers and a killer Bf3.

[Paul McKeown]

Karjakin should win from here!!! woop woop

Why "woop woop"?

Short stole your sweeties?

[Ben Purton]

No ironically he stole my Land Paul.............. Muahaha


just Im a Tony Miles fan , so yeah , im waiting for the 1a6 defeat of the tosser.

Ben

[Ben Purton]

Karjakin , different class

[Paul McKeown]

Bh5+ must be croutons, Short in the soup.

[Paul McKeown]

just Im a Tony Miles fan

Slough 4NCL connection?

[Alex Holowczak]

I'm not a fan of Karjakin at all. He switched to Russia from Ukraine on what appear to be purely monetary reasons. I think that's a stab in the back to the people who supported him in Ukraine. Having just won Corus, it's not like he'd have had cashflow problems.

[Paul McKeown]

I'm not a fan of Karjakin at all. He switched to Russia from Ukraine on what appear to be purely monetary reasons. I think that's a stab in the back to the people who supported him in Ukraine. Having just won Corus, it's not like he'd have had cashflow problems.

Holowczak/Golovchuk sounds Ukrainian... no bias there then?

[Ben Purton]

I'm not a fan of Karjakin at all. He switched to Russia from Ukraine on what appear to be purely monetary reasons. I think that's a stab in the back to the people who supported him in Ukraine. Having just won Corus, it's not like he'd have had cashflow problems.


No offence Alex.... But dont we literally have alot of players who do this in our sides now technically.

Also hes lived in Russia for longer than alot more than some of our sides have.

Ben

[Paul McKeown]

60. Qb3+ is the coup de grace, Short will resign now.

[Paul McKeown]

Kuijpers - Peng is an interesting endgame with bishops of opposite colour. Can Black win? She's trying anyway...

[Alex Holowczak]

I'm not a fan of Karjakin at all. He switched to Russia from Ukraine on what appear to be purely monetary reasons. I think that's a stab in the back to the people who supported him in Ukraine. Having just won Corus, it's not like he'd have had cashflow problems.

Holowczak/Golovchuk sounds Ukrainian... no bias there then?

While I am 1/4 Ukrainian, I'm not being biased. I'd have said the same whichever name you choose to put in place of 'Karjakin', and whichever country you choose to put in place of 'Ukraine'. Karjakin's game just so happened to be the topic of conversation.

No offence Alex.... But dont we literally have alot of players who do this in our sides now technically.

No offence taken. Are any of them professional chess players though? If they're working/living over here, then I have no real problem with that. Karjakin had absolutely no reason to switch nationality. He was entitled to live in Russia, and still play for Ukraine. If Karjakin was amateur, or had a Russian wife/children, then I wouldn't have a problem with it at all. Miffed due to my Ukrainian connection, but I could understand it.

This is worse in ice hockey. Due to rules saying you can play for Russia if you were born in a non-Russian SSR if you were born before a certain year, the whole system used to get abused. For example, Evgeni Nabokov will likely be the starting goaltender for Russia at the Olympics, even though he is from Kazakhstan, and had played for them all the way through until about 2000. The rest of the team weren't as good as him. So, Nabokov eventually switched to Russia, just because he had more chance of winning for them than Kazakhstan. No sense of national pride... disappointing. (For the record, Ukraine didn't qualify - lost to Latvia in the qualifiers.)

[Paul McKeown]

I was just teasing, Alex. I can't get aroused about which country someone plays for - countries are artificial constructs used to divide us. That is theoretical of course. In practise I burst a couple of blood vessels during any game of rugby played by Ireland...

[Paul McKeown]

About this Nabokov chappy, perhaps he felt Russian? Many Ukrainians do, after all.

[Alex Holowczak]

About this Nabokov chappy, perhaps he felt Russian? Many Ukrainians do, after all.

Well, he has always said that he felt Russian. But he isn't Russian, and probably only resided their while he played in the Russian Leagues. Interestingly, he was only drafted to the NHL in the first place because of his name - his father was known to the team who drafted him because of his exploits for... Kazakhstan.