MARK RUBERY CHESS

One of the world’s top players, and certainly one of the more interesting characters, Alexander Grischuk, gave the following interview the Chess24 site.

Chess24: All top chess players set themselves the goal of fighting for the crown. Is the World Championship title the goal of your whole life, or something you’re calm about? Alexander Grischuk: It’s foolish to declare your ambitions publicly. You need to back them up with actions, and not chatter. In modern sport there’s now a fashion for making loud declarations, like “I’ll crush them all”. Perhaps that’s good for attracting sponsors, but it strikes me as foolish.

Competition has grown many times over recently and there’s a whole array of top young chess players. Do you feel that?

Of course I do. Ten years ago the competition was less. Top young chess players are appearing thanks to computers. Twenty years ago in order to grow as a chess player it was essential to have a good coach. Now you don’t really need a coach as there are special programs – just work and don’t be lazy.

Some grandmasters express the opinion that Carlsen is a more multifaceted chess player than Kasparov. Do you agree?

Carlsen is a very strong chess player, a World Champion, but Kasparov is no. 1 for me, if you take all the chess players over the last thirty years or so.

Kasparov was considered to have a demonic effect on his opponents – they’d already be lost before the game began.

There’s no doubt he exuded a powerful energy.

Does Carlsen have such charisma?

Yes, because some strong grandmasters play much worse against him than they’re capable of doing. For example, Hikaru Nakamura has a terrible negative score against Carlsen.

Chess has dramatically shifted towards accelerated time controls. Do you see that as an inevitable demand of the times?

I don’t see any big changes in that regard, except that they’ve now begun to hold World Championships in rapid and blitz. For now it’s more just talking about it. I’d welcome it if there were more such tournaments.

Don’t accelerated time controls kill chess?

In what sense? Chess is only a game. If your opponent is better than you and wins he hasn’t killed you, after all.

People think that it’s only at the classical time control that chess approaches a work of art, while in rapid you can’t create an immortal work.

That depends on your approach to chess. If someone thinks chess possesses some sacred meaning then I can only envy that person. Perhaps I’d also like to think like that, but I don’t. For me it’s just a game and I can’t rank it alongside, for instance, an art like music.

Grischuk gave an interesting twist to the Grand Prix Attack to win the following attractive blitz game…

Grischuk,A (2750) - Vachier Lagrave,M (2795) [B23] chess.com Speed 3m+2spm 2017

1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.f4 Nc6 4.Nf3 g6 5.Bc4 Bg7 6.0–0 e6 7.d4!? Nxd4 8.Be3 Nxf3+ 9.Qxf3 Ne7 10.Rad1 0–0 11.Bxc5 Qc7 12.Bxd6 Qxc4 13.Bxe7 Re8 14.e5 Rxe7 15.Rd8+ Bf8 16.Ne4 Kg7 17.Nf6 Qxc2 (17…Rd7! 18 Nxd7 Be7 is fine for Black) 18.Qh3 h5 19.Qg3 Qf5 20.Rfd1 b6 21.Rxf8! Kxf8 22.Rd8+ Kg7 23.Rg8+ Kh6

24.h4! (Setting up a mating net with Qg5+) 1–0

At Hastings about a quarter of all male spectators seem to rattle coins in their pockets – even if they sit in the first row. In Yugoslavia they will applaud if Tal sacrifices his queen – that is different.’ (Bent Larsen)