Adams scores a win at Linares as Kasparov has a bye in round 4

[Jack Rabbit]

British grandmaster Michael Adams, the seventh highest-ranked player in the world, defeated Spaniard Francisco Vallejo in the fourth round of the 22nd Ciudad de Linares chess tournament in Jaen Province, Spain.

It was Adams' first victory of the tournament. He lost in the opening round Wednesday to Bulgarian grandmaster Veselin Topalov.

It was Vellejo's second consecutive loss in tournament. Yesterday, he went down to former world champion Garry Kasparov of Russia.

In other action at Linares today, Topalov drew his game with Hungarian Peter Leko and India's Viswanathan Anand drew with Rustam Kasimdzhanov of Uzbekistan. Kasparov had a bye.

Five players in the tournament currently have two points each: Kasparov, Anand, Adams, Leko and Kasimdzhanov. Topalov has a point and a half and Vallejo a half point. Due to fact there is an odd number of competitors and one player gets a bye in each round, three players -- Adams, Kasimdzhanov and Leko -- have played four games while the others have played three.

Adams played White and, as he usually does, opened with his King's pawn (1. e4) Vellejo responded with the Sicilian Defense (1. -- c5) and the game went into the famous Najdorf variation (2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6), the favorite defense of former world champion Bobby Fischer. The game continued 6. Be3 Ng4 7. Bg5 h6 8. Bh4 g5 9. Bg3 Bg7. The line chosen by Vallejo might be considered dubious owing to the neglect of the center and the weakening of the King side, where Black usually castles; the most common moves for Black after 6. Be3 are 6. -- e6 and 6. -- e5, either of which will provide Black with a satisfactory game. The only advantage of the line chosen by Vallejo is that it is less well analyzed. After 10. h3 Ne5 11. Be2 Nbc6 12. Nb3 b5 13. Nd5 Nc4 14. Bxc4 bxc4, White temporarily sacrificed a pawn for control of an open file (15. Nd2 Bxb2 16. Rb1). White quickly regained the pawn with a superior game after 16. -- Be5 17. Nxc4 Bxg3 18. fxg3.

The game continued: 18. -- Be6 19. 0-0 Rb8 20. Rb3 Rb5 21. Kh2 0-0 22. Nce3 Ne5 23. c4 Rc5 24. Qh5 Kh7.

BLACK: Vallejo

WHITE: Adams

Position after Black's 24th move

From this position, the game went on 25.Rb7 Re8 26.Nf5 Bxf5 27.exf5 Rf8 28.Nxe7 Qa8 29.Rfb1 Rb5 30.cxb5 Qxb7 31.f6 Qe4 32.Rf1 Rh8 33.Nf5 Kg8 34.bxa6. Black resigned as he must defend simultaneously against a heavy King side attack and an advancing passed pawn on the a-file.

Kasparov returns to action tomorrow playing White against Adams. Tomorrow's other games have Kasimdzhanov playing White against Topalov and Vallejo playing Anand. Leko has the bye.

More analysis is on the English language edition of German website ChessBase.com.

Official Tournament website.

Diagram from ChessBase.

[allemand]

1. Nice game by Adams.

Exchanging the dark-squared bishops seems to have been a bad idea and it's possible that Vallejo's position is already strategically lost after 21...0-0.

There are many interesting lines in the diagram position, for example after 25.Rb7 Nd7 there is 26.Ng4! Bxg4 27.Rxf7+ Rxf7 28.Qxf7+ Kh8 29.Nxe7 Bh5 30.Qe6 Qf8 31.Rxd7 Re5 32.Ng6+ Bxg6 33.Qxg6 Re7 34.Qxd6 Re8 35.Qd4+ Kg8 36.Qd5+ Kh8 37.Rf7 Qg8 38.Qd4+ and checkmate.

Or after 25.Rb7 Re8 26.Nf5 Bxf5 27.exf5, if Vallejo had played 27...Qa8 there is 28.Nf6+! exf6 29.Rxf7+! Nxf7 30.Dxf7+ Kh8 31.Qxf6 Kf8 32.Qg6+ Kf8 33.f6 Qb7 34.f7 Rb8 35.Rf6! Qc8 36.Qg8+ Ke7 37.f8Q+ Qxf8 38.Qe6+ Kd8 39.Rxf8+ etc.

Leko was very lucky to draw his game against Topalov. At the playchess server spectators were already calling for Leko to resign, but Topalov blundered away the win.