Breakfast tomorrow: World Cup round 4

Peter Svidler leads Alexander Grisckuk 2-1 for the World Cup title.  Svidler has White and the two Russians are friends: a quick draw is not out of the realm of possibility.  Both players have already secured a slot as one of the eight candidates for the next world championship.

Vassily Ivanchuk leads Ruslan Ponomariov 2-1 in the match for third place.  To me, the Ukranian matchup is more fascinating: Ivanchuk has not been a Candidate in the classical cycle for twenty (!!) years, and in 2002, he lost a match to the teenaged Ponomariov for the pre-unification "FIDE World Championship" title.  The winner automatically qualifies for the 2013 Candidates, while the loser is very unlikely to earn an invitation.  Ponomariov managed to apply some pressure in today's game, but never came close to converting a pawn-up endgame.

Catch up on previous rounds at The Week in Chess, and follow the pre-dawn action at the official site!

World Cup catchup

Moiseenko-NavaraWorld Cup 2011White to move
A week ago today: David Navara had just reached an easily winning position in the difficult Q vs. R ending, and the 50-move rule was no longer a problem.  But Navara offered a draw...on purpose!

Lubomir Kavalek explains this act of sportsmanship.

The World Cup's knockout format can  lead to some rather random results, which would have been particularly unfortunate given that this event is being used to qualify three players for the World Championship.  But the four quarterfinalists are all among the world's elite: Grischuk faces Ivanchuk, and Svidler faces Ponomariov.  The winners automatically qualify for the 2014 World Championship cycle; the losers play a match, the winner of which also qualifies.

Someone had to lose the match between fan favorites Gata Kamsky and Peter Svidler. Kamsky had the honor of losing to the most beautiful move of the World Cup:

Svidler's point after 26...Re2!! was that 27.Qxe2 loses to 27...Qg3! (The immediate 26...Qg3 is met by 27.Nc6, stopping the mate threat.) Someone (I don't remember who) described the combination as worthy of Frank Marshall.  Edit a few days later—aha, it was Mig.

Early risers are urged to check out Game 1 of the semifinals tomorrow morning at the excellent tournament website! If you hear Russian, don't panic: there is an English-language simulcast.

Shipov annotates Dortmund live

GM Sergei Shipov

Wonderful stuff at Chess in Translation.

The live game (Friday, it's Ponomariov-Kramnik: not a permalink) is here.

Yesterday's Kramnik-Le Quang Liem is here.

Gelfand leads 7-6 in playoffs

One more blitz game to go? You can follow the action here. (The London Chess Classic games are being broadcast on the same site.)

Gelfand - Ponomariov, tiebreak round 4

Gelfand-Ponomariov

Black to move played 25...Bxb3!?

 
Former FIDE World Champion Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine just won a clutch game with Black to tie up the playoffs with Boris Gelfand of Israel.  Match score is 4-4: play continues immediately.