European Individual Chess Championship Mar 21st - 3rd Apr

[David Sedgwick]

My subjective impression had been that, apart from Luke McShane, the performances of the English players had been a little disappointing. In fact, six of the eight outperformed their ratings.

It just goes to show the strength of the tournament.

[David Sedgwick]

Have norm chances been calculated yet for the final round, or indeed (given the length of the tournament) has anyone achieved norms yet of any sort for ones that are less than 11-round norms? I took a quick look at the other English and Scottish players, but none seem to be in the running for norms (I could be wrong though). I was wondering why there weren't more English IMs at this event - there would be a variety of reasons, I suppose, but there are a lot of IMs from other countries.

I suppose the fact that the top 49 boards are all GMs does kind of explain why this might not be happy hunting ground for GM-norm seekers! The highest-placed IMs for round 10 appear to be:

Daniil Dubov (6)
Anna Muzychuk (6)
Anthony Wirig (6)
Helgi Dam Ziska (6)
Luka Paichadze (6)
Kiprian Berbatov (6)
Peter Michalik (6)
Serghei Vedmediuc (6)
Sven Telljohann (6)
Lela Javakhishvili (6)

I tried looking on the website and here for something about what the GM norm would likely be, but haven't found anything yet. Ditto for IM norms, though I would have thought that would be even harder to get here given the number of GMs floating around.

The Europe Echecs site, http://www.europe-echecs.com, has some information about norms obtained by French players.

My approximate translation:

"After ten rounds, two French players have already achieved GM norms: Anthony Wirig (3rd norm, which should earn him the title) and Kevin Terrieux (2nd norm). Clement Houriez has achieved his second IM norm."

[Matthew Peat]

Mcshane now showing as 24th ......... What happened there?

[LozCooper]

Mcshane now showing as 24th ......... What happened there?

I wish I knew but can't say I'm impressed. I do wonder if Mr Feller will be allowed to take up his place.

[Richard Bates]

Mcshane now showing as 24th ......... What happened there?

I wish I knew but can't say I'm impressed.

A late result? One player on 7.5 won a game in 97 moves.

[LozCooper]

Mcshane now showing as 24th ......... What happened there?

I wish I knew but can't say I'm impressed.

A late result? One player on 7.5 won a game in 97 moves.

I think you're right. I just checked the results that I updated earlier and the board involving Hracek didn't have a result in so it looked like that result was missing from the final rankings. I'll be watching the developments regarding Mr Feller and any possible ban from FIDE events even more closely now.

[IngridLauterbach]

Did not at least Mamedov already qualify last year in Rijeka, so that he would not count for the 23?

[LozCooper]

Did not at least Mamedov already qualify last year in Rijeka, so that he would not count for the 23?

Peter Svidler may already have qualified by rating so there are more questions than answers at this stage

[David Sedgwick]

Feller played awesome chess..

If he gets one of the qualification spots, that will make the appeal more interesting!

Transcript of part of a video interview is here:

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=7118

Plus the interview itself for those who understand French. Can those who understand French give a flavour of what else is said in the interview?

I've just tried to listen to it. My French isn't really good enough, but I think it was mostly small talk apart from the questions about the open letter and other aspects of the cheating controversy.

[Mick Norris]

I think I’m right that the World Cup takes place in odd numbered years (Gelfand won in 2009)
There are 128 players, so not unreasonable that 46 come from Europe

From the 2010 European, according to the FIDE website 23 players qualified for the World Cup: Nepomniachtchi, Jobava, Timofeev, Efimenko, Lysy, Almasi, Tomashevski, Rodshtein, Salgado Lopez, Pashikian, Mamedov, Movsesian, Drozdovskij, Babula, Vorobiov, Akopian, Berkes, Potkin, Halkias, Nisipeanu, Alekseev, Grachev and Socko.

An additional 23 qualify this time, so Luke must be in if he finished 24th and Mamedov was above him

[LozCooper]

I think I’m right that the World Cup takes place in odd numbered years (Gelfand won in 2009)
There are 128 players, so not unreasonable that 46 come from Europe

From the 2010 European, according to the FIDE website 23 players qualified for the World Cup: Nepomniachtchi, Jobava, Timofeev, Efimenko, Lysy, Almasi, Tomashevski, Rodshtein, Salgado Lopez, Pashikian, Mamedov, Movsesian, Drozdovskij, Babula, Vorobiov, Akopian, Berkes, Potkin, Halkias, Nisipeanu, Alekseev, Grachev and Socko.

An additional 23 qualify this time, so Luke must be in if he finished 24th and Mamedov was above him

It does sound like he has a qualifying place, it's a shame he lost the last round and missed out on 1st= but it's also positive that he's up there playing for the big prizes. I suppose after the London Chess Classic and Tata Steel this will seem like a disappointment but it's still a 2684 performance and he now has the World Cup, in addition to the London Chess Classic and the A group in Tata Steel to look forward to amongst his other tournaments in the next 12 months.

[William Metcalfe]

Gawain must be pleased with his performance as well why does he have such a good record against players rated a lot higher than himself.

[LozCooper]

Gawain must be pleased with his performance as well why does he have such a good record against players rated a lot higher than himself.

The same is true of most of our top players, in particular, Adams & McShane.

[Mick Norris]

World Cup Qualification explained here:
http://www.thechessmind.net/

"...the top three, in tiebreak order, were Potkin, Wojtaszek, and Polgar.

They finished with 8.5 points, and 11 more players finished with 8. (Vallejo Pons, Ragger, Feller, Svidler, R. Mamedov, Vitiugov, Zhigalko, Jakovenko, Korobov, Inarkiev and Postny.) All of these players qualified for the World Cup, as did the top eleven (of 29) players with 7.5: Azarov, Khairullin, Kobalia, Guliyev, Zherebukh, Riazantsev, Iordachescu, Lupulescu, McShane, Fridman and Motylev. (Yes, that adds up to 26 and only 23 qualifying spots were available. The solution to the mystery is that Potkin, Svidler and R. Mamedov had already qualified for the World Cup!)"

[Sean Hewitt]

I can confirm that Luke finished 24th and that this is good enough to qualify because some already qualified players finished above him. I was able to give Luke this news last night.

I can also confirm that 6 GM & 12 IM norms were achieved.