report from chessdom

Fabiano Caruana with major contribution to the victory in the final

Linex Magic won the Spanish CECLUB Chess Championship in a hard fought final against Marcote - Kasparov. All games of the final finished in a draw, except for the one of Caruana - Graf, where the Italian pressed from start to the end and used every mistake of his opponent.

On the top table Shirov and Gashimov protagonized one of the most interesting games of the day. The position quickly became disbalanced and Gashimov got a slight advantage. However, slight inaccuracies around move 30 equalized the position on the board. With active play both players tried to find a way to the victory, but finally Shirov defended well to get the draw.

Candelario was offered an early queen exchange by Salgado, offered a draw and the game finished peacefully. Vallejo and Adams were one of the first to shake hands after a 22 moves draw. Near the same time Milov and Cheparinov also headed for the same score with a rook and pawns ending. Just before the time control, Inarkiev and Sargissian went for a perpetual to increase the tention even more.

Caruana started to build positional advantage early in the game. With a nice knight exchange for two pawns on 30. Nxd5 Caruana achieved a very active position. While looking for a way out, Graf made a blunder with 32... Na7, losing a full bishop and practically deciding the outcome of the game. Graf's position was hopeless and with the attempt to activate the knight 39... Nb5 he walked into a mate that Caruana did not miss.

To replay all games go to the Live games arena and click on the Spanish CECLUB tab. The information about yesterday's semi final is here.

1 GM Shirov Alexei 2718 1/2 GM Gashimov Vugar 2768
2 GM Adams Michael 2698 1/2 GM Vallejo Pons Francisco 2687
3 GM Sargissian Gabriel 2568 1/2 GM Inarkiev Ernesto 2645
4 GM Cheparinov Ivan 2671 1/2 GM Milov Vadim 2652
5 GM Caruana Fabiano 2654 1-0 GM Graf Alexander 2596
6 IM Perez Candelario Manuel 2512 1/2 GM Salgado Lopez 2550