Tuesday, July 13, 2010

A trap in the Slav and QGA

In the post below, Bill remarked that Jayakumar-Shetty was an uneventful draw. Indeed, but there was one moment of potential drama that Adarsh wisely avoided. Had he played 10.Rd1?? instead of his 10.Re1! he would have fallen into a trap that has claimed many victims, including former Women's World Champion Maia Chiburdanidze. In addition to the Slav Defense (as in Adarsh's and Chiburdanidze's games), it also often arises from the Queen's Gambit Accepted, e.g. 1.d4 d5 2.c4 dxc4 3.Nf3 Nf6 4.Qa4+ c6 5.Qxc4 Bf5 etc. After 10.Rd1?? Bc2!, Black must give up the exchange, since 11.Rd2?? Nb6 wins the queen.

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