2017 Asian Continental Championship Ental Championship

1- 2. GM Wang Hao CHN 2680, GM Bu Xiangzhi CHN 2697, 7.0/9

3-4. GM Vidit Santosh Gujrathi IND 2687, GM Yu Yangyi CHN 2743, 6.5/9

5-9. GM Tsegmed Batchuluun MGL 2525, GM Julio Catalino Sadorra PHI 2575, GM Wei Yi CHN 2732, GM Baskaran Adhiban IND 2672, GM Surya Shekhar Ganguly IND 2653, 6.0/9

10-15. GM Parham Maghsoodloo IRI 2577, GM SP Sethuraman IND 2633, GM Rinat Jumabayev KAZ 2625, GM Deep Sengupta IND 2586, GM Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son VIE 2632, GM Lu Shanglei CHN 2619, 5.5/9 Total of 69 participants Time Control: 90 minutes for the fitst 40 moves, then 30 minutes play-to-finish with 30 seconds added after every move starting move 1.

Here is a list of all the Asian Continental Champions since the competition started in 1998: 1998 Tehran, Rustam Kaimdzhanov UZB 2000 Udaipur, Xu Jun CHN 2001 Calcutta, Xu Jun CHN 2003 Doha, Krishnan Sasikiran IND 2005 Hyderabad, Zhang Zhong CHN 2007 Cebu, Zhang Pengxiang CHN ( tied with Wang Hao, but Zhang declared winner)

2009 Subic Bay, Surya Shekhar Ganguly IND 2010 Subic Bay, Ni Hua CHN 2011 Mashhad, Penteala Harikrishna IND (on tie-break over China’s Yu Yangyi and Vietnam’s Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son)

2012 Ho Chi Minh, Parimarjan Negi IND (the luckless Yu Yangyi once again tied for 1st but lost out on tie-breaks) 2013 Manila, Li Chao CHN 2014 Sharjah, Yu Yangyi CHN (finally!) 2015 Al Ain, Salem AR Saleh UAE (Ganguly had the same number of points but was relegated to 2nd on tie-breaks) 2016 Tashkent, SP Sethuraman IND Notice anything from that list? No Filipino has ever won. GM Darwin Laylo tied for third place in Cebu 2007, while in 2009 Subic Bay GM Joey Antonio likewise tied for third — he was leading most of the way but fell in the penultimate round to the eventual winner Ganguly.

The closest we ever got was in 2010 when Wesley So tied for second half a point behind Ni Hua. This was replicated in 2013 when Mark Paragua and Oliver Barbosa likewise tied for second.

Here in Chengdu the Filipino GM Julio Catalino Sadorra, seeded a lowly 20th at the start, put up a strong showing and, by winning all his four black games and drawing his four white games, tied for the lead in the penultimate round. In the last round he was matched against co-leader Wang Hao of China. A win by Ino means a Filipinos is Asian Continental Champion for the first time in history. A draw would ensure qualification to the 2017 World Cup later this year. Sadly he lost and finished 6th, just shy of the top 5 spots which would book him a ticket to Tbilisi for the World Cup.

Anyway, Ino put up a worthy challenge. My favorite is this game from the 7th round. Nowadays, everybody and his cousin is playing the Catalan. Now we have transposed to the Stonewall Dutch.

When studying this game I picked up the Encyclopedia of Chess Openings and it gave the following game as reference (A94/05): 10...Qe8 11.Ne1 Qh5 12.f3 Ng5 13.Nd3 Nh3+ 14.Kh1 Bd6 15. f4 Nf6 16. Bf3 Ng4 17.Bxg4 fxg4 18.e4 g5 19.fxg5 Bd7 20.Ne5 from Tukmakov-Kaenel, Lenk 1992 and the evaluation was that White is slightly better. This is inaccurate. After 20...Bxe5 21.dxe5 dxe4! 22.c5 (22.Nxe4 c5 The black bishop goes to c6 and White is really in trouble) 22...Nf2+ 23.Kg1 e3 24.Nc4 Rf3! 25.Nxe3 Raf8 White is completely lost. If he does not give up material for the black knight on f2 and plays, say 26.Nc4 he is mated by 26...Rxg3+! 27.hxg3 Qh1#.

Ino’s new idea — instead of going ahead with the kingside attack straight away he first clarifies the situation in the queenside.

Now Ino goes back to the kingside.

A cunning move. You will see why in my next note. 27.Rxd7 Rg8 28.Rxh7+ (forced) 28... Qxh7 29.Bc3 e5! Black has a big plus. If 30.fxe5 Rxg2+! 31.Kxg2 Rg8+ 32.Kf1 Bxf2 33.e6+ (33. Qxf2 Qxd3+; 33.Kxf2 Qxh2+) 33...d4 34.Bb2 Rg1+! Black mates.

There is a trap here: 27...Nxc5? 28.Rxh7+! Qxh7 (28...Kxh7 29.Rh3+ Kg7 30.Rg3) 29.Rh3 and Ino will have to give up his queen.

Black bails out to a better ending. Perhaps better is to keep up the pressure with 30...e5! 31.fxe5 Qc2 32.Ba1 Rg6. Just when it looks like White has equalized Ino suddenly strikes with...

A tricky move.

The last move before time control and Wen Yang did not have time to calculate 40.Bxd4 which looks like it loses a piece to 40...Ne8 which simultaneously attacks the rook and bishop, however 41.Rf7+ Kg6 42.Bb6 Rb8 43.Re7 and the piece is saved.

The losing move. The only move here is to bring back the rook to the first rank: 41.Rc1! Now it is too late.

Wen Yang resigns. If he takes the knight then 44.Rxc4 d2 queens the pawn. If he doesn’t take the knight then 44.Kf3 d2 45.Rd1 Nxe5+ 46.fxe5 Kxe5 47.Ke2 Rd4 48.Rxd2 Rxd2+ 49.Kxd2 Kd4 the a4–pawn is a goner and with it the game.

Sadorra still has a chance to qualify — the top 5 finishers were Wang Hao, Bu Xiangzhi and Yu Yangyi of China, Vidit Santosh Gujrathi of India and Tsegmed Batchuluun of Mongolia. FIDE regulations provide that the top 18 highest rated players are automatically qualified to the World Cup using the average of all published ratings from February 2016 to January 2017. These averages placed the Chinese GM Yu Yangyi at no. 17, meaning he already has a slot in the World Cup and should not be counted for the 5 qualifying places from the Asian Continental. Since Ino is at no. 6 he is the logical candidate to replace Yu Yangyi. Our federation needs to get clarification on this issue.

Yu Yangyi did not have a smooth tournament and had to survive some hairy moments, but this victory over the strong Indian GM is my favorite game of the entire tournament — domination! *** Sengupta, Deep (2586) — Yu, Yangyi (2743) [D03] ASIA-Ch 2017 Chengdu (6), 17.05.2017 1. d4 Nf6 2. Nf3 g6 3. Bg5 d5 4. e3 Bg7 5. Nbd2 h6 6. Bf4 0– 0 7. Bd3 c5 8. c3 Nc6 9.Ne5 A lot of players I know would play 9.h3 without thinking — it preserves the dark-squared bishop in case of a later ...Nh5. Black has completely equalized and is already threatening ...d5–d4.

White’s pieces are not coordinated — Yu Yangyi is now threatening ...a5–a4.

If 21...Qxb2 22.Nb3 Rxa2 23.Rxa2 White’s position can be held. Now, with 21... Qb5+ 22.Kg1 inserted, this defence is no longer available. Let’s follow the game for awhile.

This is what I am talking about. If 23.Nb3 Rxa2 24.Rxa2?? Qb1+ with the king on g1 instead of f1 White is now mated.

After 23.Nb3 Rxa2 White is forced to play 24.Rd1 but then 24...Ra3 ties up White’s pieces.

To enable his knight to go to f4.

[27.Qxc2 dxc2 and after the rook moves then ...Ne2+ finishes off White.]

White wants to activate his rook via h3. [30.fxg3 Re2]

Let’s all keep our fingers crossed that we can get a favorable ruling from FIDE on Ino’s case.