The youth is winning

Before the last round began, the accurate and practical boy Evgueni Alexeev, the leader in the company of St.Petersburg strongest players, quite reasonably offered a draw to his own trainer. Grandmaster Ionov accepted. Meanwhile, grandmaster Valery Popov, who is constantly growing as a player, was looking for a victory in his game against international master Sivokho, who had taught Alexeev chess for several years. And Popov won, for the fourth time in a series.

So the St.Petersburg Champion is Popov, holder of super ratings on ICC, participant of the worthiest tournament, devoted to V. Korchnoi’s jubilee, a dangerous fighter of open tournaments with any time control. The list of players, authorised to take part in the Russia Championship, looks as follows: Khalifman, Svidler, Sakaev, Aseev, Ivanov, Popov and Alexeev. There is no doubt that Alexeev’s trainer, Ionov, will be allowed to play too. Will there be new kings from St.Petersburg in Russia? Sounds doubtful…

Symbolic prizes, set by the Russian Federation, can’t allure our masters. The Russian Champion under 20 E. Shaposhnikov won a huge prize of 1000 rbl. (some $35). It’s a pleasure that the sum was round in the national currency, but still it was not too high. Tickets, hotel, boarding become too expensive for many of the players. The FIDE president K. Ilyumzhinov has nothing to do with this. The situation with chess in Russia begins to resemble the situation with ice-hockey. Who knows, what the reasons are. Are sponsors frightened by V. Putin? Or maybe chess officials are too thievish? The chess budget is small…

Now leave this alone and look how champions win games:

Sivokho – Popov
Round 11

1. e4 c5 2. c3 d5 3. exd5 Qxd5 4. d4 Nf6 5. Nf3 Bg4 6. Be2 e6 7. h3 Bh5 8. Be3 cxd4 9. cxd4 Nc6 10. Nc3 Qd6 11. g4 Bg6 12. Ne5 Be7 13. O-O O-O 14. Bf4 Nd5

15. Nxg6 Nxf4 16. Nxf8 Nxd4

17. Bf3 Nxh3+ 18. Kh1 Rxf8 19. Bxb7 Rb8 20. Bg2 Qf4

21. Qc1 Nxf2+ 22. Kg1 Nf3+

23. Kxf2 Bc5+ 24. Ke2 Rxb2+ 25. Qxb2 Qe3+ 26. Kd1 Qd3+

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