Batumi Olympiad 2018

Tim Harding · 03-10-2018 6:57pm

Round 10, Open. Ireland v Tunisia
Top pairings as I guessed above, also France-Croatia and Vietnam-Germany

Women's: Ireland-Ecuador

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 8:56am

Eibhia is rested today for Round 10 as the Ladies take on Ecuador. Only Gearoidin on 4 is higher rated than her opponent, but after yesterday we believe anything is possible.

In the Open, David Fitzsimons is rested today. We are higher rated on every board against Tunisia in the Open.

Big games to watch:
Ding Liren v Duda (who has just drawn, from dodgy positions, against Aronian and Caruana);
Aronian v Caruana (and Robson gets a game today);
Karjakin v Adams; Nepo' v McShane; Kramnik v Howell; Vitiugov v Gawain Jones;
Mamedyarov v Ivanchuk;
Giri v Harikrishna (Vishy rested)

This is the last round at the noon start time. I am not sure whether it's 8am or 9am IST that the final round begins tomorrow.

reunion · 04-10-2018 3:40pm

Baburin just missed Rxd3 on move 36 which would have turned the game around!

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 3:46pm

Oh no! Horrific blunder by Alex Baburin when he was on the verge of going into a won queen endgame (not 36 e4?? but 36 Rxd3 Qxd3 37 Nxe8). Alex Lopez lost earlier so this looks like 1 or 1.5 for us instead of a possible won match.
Stephen has reached the time control in a probably won rook ending.

It looks like the ladies are going to suffer a whitewash.
The only good thing is that a loss today can set up winnable matches for the last round and an ultimately higher placing.

Gawain has drawn with Vitiugov but England will probably lose to Russia in the end.
China have beaten Poland 3-1 and the USA are winning their match so it looks like a USA v China showdown tomorrow, with Poland and Russia in with the best chance of bronze.

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 3:47pm

reunion wrote: »

Baburin just missed Rxd3 on move 36 which would have turned the game around!

Not a question of turning it around. Alex was better throughout and the Rxe5 exchange sac was the start of a winning combination but he somehow got confused and played Rxd3 a move too late.

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 4:53pm

Stephen Jessel must have won though chess24 is currently showing the reverse result.
Unfortunately he is still standing to lose a couple of rating points in this event and badly needs a win tomorrow.

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 6:14pm

Last round starts tomorrow 0800 IST. Team pairings will probably be available in an hour or so.
In the Open it must be USA-China, and probably France v Russia, Poland v India (who are 1MP behind).
Poland have played so many strong teams already (including the other four in the top five) that tiebreaks will probably give them a good chance of silver or bronze if they don't lose tomorrow. They have been the heroes of this event and will be very disappointed if they come away with nothing.
If USA and China draw then the tiebreaks could be very close again.
Captains have until 2400 local time (2100 here) to submit their last round team compositions, else 1-4 have to play.
So we should see the board pairings online before bedtime.

cdeb · 04-10-2018 7:36pm

The Maldives for the men; bit of a surprising draw as they're 153rd seed and don't have anyone higher than 1870. Their board 3 is in excellent form - 2200 performance - but this should be a 4-0. Three defeats in a row has seen us plummet down the standings, and it looks like we'll be a fair bit off our seeding of 66th (we're currently in 106th)

The Women have a winnable tie against Japan, seeded a few places below them. A win and they should beat their seeding of 87th; they currently stand 103rd.

USA v China for gold in the Open, but Poland's tie-break is better than both, so they should win by beating India if the US and China draw.

It's Russia v China on 1 in the Women's section; China have a one-point lead and a good headstart on tie-break and I think would likely win outright in the event of a match draw.

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 10:02pm

Board pairings up. Alex Lopez and Eibhia are sitting this one out.

It's certainly very disappointing that the Open team which is possibly the strongest Ireland ever sent to an Olympiad has lost three successive matches and the top three are all losing rating points.
I guess when they get back we shall find out about the mystery illness which seems to have undermined the performance.

The top Open match tomorrow should be great: 8am start remember!
The teams on 15MP have an outside chance of bronze if India beat Poland but tiebreaks probably won't favour the teams in matches 4-6.
Still, we can recall how two years ago it came down to Sonneborn-Berger for first and one late-finishing game in a lower match decided first place. Heavy wins can make a difference.

England, from that point of view, at least have the most favourable pairing in that Kazakhstan, while undeniably string, look a lot less formidable than the alternatives.

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the results is that Germany have not lost a match: won 5, drawn 5.

Tim Harding · 04-10-2018 10:07pm

It's been pointed out on the English forum that in the Open, the blind team (IBCA) play the deaf team (ICCD) perhaps for the first time.
I believe Gerry Graham could be involved in that match as an arbiter.

Retd.LoyolaCpt · 04-10-2018 11:37pm

Tim Harding wrote: »

It's certainly very disappointing that the Open team which is possibly the strongest Ireland ever sent to an Olympiad has lost three successive matches and the top three are all losing rating points.
I guess when they get back we shall find out about the mystery illness which seems to have undermined the performance.

By rating, I think its pretty far off our strongest team ever. The teams with a 2550 Baburin and 2480 Kelly - with Quinn, Heidenfeld, a young Collins etc.

This was probably the best team by rating (2461):
http://chess-results.com/tnr16314.aspx?lan=1&art=20&fed=IRL&flag=30

But these were also better by rating too:
http://chess-results.com/tnr140380.aspx?lan=1&art=20&fed=IRL&flag=30
http://chess-results.com/tnr1081.aspx?lan=1&art=20&snr=49&turdet=YES&flag=30
http://chess-results.com/tnr3410.aspx?lan=1&art=20&snr=54&flag=30
http://chess-results.com/tnr1881.aspx?lan=1&art=20&fed=IRL&flag=30

Not much of a mystery; stomach bugs. Hopefully both teams can finish strong regardless.

Tim Harding · 05-10-2018 12:52pm

Thanks for those links.
Good 4-0 win for the Open team while the Women have 2.5 already but Gearoidin is in trouble in the last game.

The Open will come down to tiebreaks. The medal calculations cannot be made until the last game finishes probably

USA-China was four draws and likewise Poland-India.
Russia beat France and England have beaten Kazakhstan with Gawain's game still going.

The Czech match with Ukraine is 1-1 with boards 3 and 4 still running at 12.50.

Several key games are still in progress in the Women's tournament.

Tim Harding · 05-10-2018 2:03pm

After almost six hours, still waiting for the final decision on tiebreaks.
In the Women's, Russia just threw away the gold medal. They were 1.5-0.5 up v China but Girya failed to win, several pawns up. Then Kosteniuk, who was probably holding against Ju Wenjun, made an incorrect claim of threefold repetition. When play resumed, she cracked up immediately and China drew the match 2-2.

So either China or Ukraine has won the Women's with Georgia possibly third.

The Open ended with USA, China and Russia on 18 MP but who gets which medal is unclear, maybe China have won.

Poland and England finished on 17 MP and then several teams on 16 MP.

Commentary has ended now and they said the official results will probably go up around 3pm IST at
http://chess-results.com/tnr368908.aspx?lan=1&art=0&flag=30

Also the board prize rankings will go up later, but it's clear that David Howell did very well on board 3, scoring 7.5/10, only losing to Kramnik.

Tim Harding · 05-10-2018 2:37pm

Official results are up now.
OPEN: 1 China 2. USA 3. Russia 4. Poland 5. England
David Howell 4th best player on board 3.
82. Ireland 94. Scotland 100. Wales

WOMEN: 1. China 2. Ukraine 3. Georgia-1.
29. England 73. Scotland. 75. Wales 83. Ireland

Ketevan Arakhamia-Grant scored an amazing 10.5/11 for Scotland but won't get a board prize I guess because her Rp is depressed by the lower ratings of some opponents. Only a WIM from Moldova (who had White) didn't lose to her.

I will put the final Irish scores in my next posting.

Tim Harding · 05-10-2018 2:55pm

Irish results.
WOMEN> Seeded 87 but finished 83, a positive result.
Won 5 matches, drew one and lost five for 11 MP.
Diana Mirza (1960) 4.5/9 Rp 1992 +12.4
Mercedes Plaza Reino (1727) 4/10 Rp1803 +21.2
Hannah Lowry-O'Reilly (1716) 5/9 Rp1804 +21
Gearoidin Ui Laighleis (1791) 4/9 Rp 1666 -28
Eibhia Ni Mhuireagain (1655) 2/7 Rp 1528 -50

The three teenage players have K=40, hence a bigger rating swing.
The debutante Eibhia will do better after this experience. I was very impressed at the Open in August, where I was arbiter, how she kept her cool (Jessel-style) playing on increment for ages and brought home the point.

OPEN>
Seeded 66 but finished 82.
Also won 5 matches, drew one and lost five for 11 MP. Arguably the best result was the 1-3 against Russia.
Alex Baburin (2452) 5/9 Rp2425 -1.1 Very solid on the whole but marred by the disaster yesterday.
Alex Lopez (2433) 3.5/8 Rp2334 -10.8 After his recent run of excellent results, I guess he'll be very disappointed.
Conor O'Donnell (2360) 3/9 Rp2168 -44 Maybe best to concentrate on university and look for the third norm next summer?
Stephen Jessel (2317) 6/9 Rp2310 +1.2 Highest scorer and two late wins got his rating moving upwards again, however slightly.
David Fitzsimons (2316) 6/9 Rp2329 +2.5 Impressive draw with Russia; will have learned a lot.

Batumi Olympiad 2018

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