Chess: English amateur defeats Ukrainian champion in style

The 2023 European individual championship, with nearly 500 entries, is currently in progress at Vrnjačka Banja, Serbia, and the fortunes of the nine English players can be followed online at chess-results.com.  

It is still early days in the 11 rounds, and a fine first round  for England was followed by a second round slump with just two draws and seven defeats. The highlight so far has been a major upset in the opening round when the Warwickshire amateur Tristan Cox, a chess veteran at 39, defeated the grandmaster and four-time Ukraine champion Valeriy Neverov.

Key points in the game are 3 f3, a sign of aggressive intent, 19 e5! and 21 f5! setting up Nd5-e7-f5 to expose Black’s king, 31 Ra3! bringing a second rook into the attack at h3, and the final assault by White’s queen and rook. Black resigned due to 41 . . . Qg6 42 Qe7+ Qf7 43 Rh7+! winning the queen, while other lines lead to mate.

Tristan Cox v Valeriy Neverov

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.f3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.Nc3 O-O 6.Nge2 c5 7.d5 e6 8.Ng3 exd5 9.cxd5 a6 10.a4 h5 11.Bg5 Qe8 12.Bd3 Nh7 13.Bf4 Qe7 14.Nge2 Nd7 15.O-O Ne5 16.Bc2 Bd7 17.Bc1 b5 18.f4 Ng4 19.e5 dxe5 20.d6 Qe8 21.f5 Bxf5 22.Bxf5 gxf5 23.Nd5 Rd8 24.Ne7+ Kh8 25.Nxf5 Qe6 26.Neg3 Ngf6 27.axb5 axb5 28.Nxh5 Nxh5 29.Qxh5 Rxd6 30.Nxd6 Qxd6 31.Ra3 e4 32.Rh3 Qg6 33.Qxc5 f5 34.Bf4 Rg8 35.Rg3 Qf6 36.Rxg7 Qxg7 37.Be5 Nf6 38.Bxf6 Qxf6 39.Rxf5 Qe6 40.Rh5+ Kg7 41.Qg5+ 1-0

On the same day as Cox’s attacking surge, there was another notable attacking game, which won the brilliancy prize in the annual Oxford v Cambridge varsity match at the RAC, Pall Mall, London, where a 4-4 draw left Cambridge two ahead in the historic series begun in 1873.

It was a rare case of checkmate on the board as Cambridge’s fourth board, Daniel Gallagher, caught Max French’s king with a combined assault by queen and rook, the identical lethal piece partnership which Tristan Cox was simultaneously using in Serbia.

The opening of the varsity game is also worth considering for use in your own games against the solid Caro-Kann 1 e4 c6 2 d4 d5.  White’s 3 f3!? is a rare sideline which tempts Black into 3 . . . dxe4 4 fxe4 when the statistics favour White’s attacking chances, while in the game as played it transposes into a French Defence line where several top GMs prefer the white side.

Puzzle 2510

P ConNers v Maia Chburdanidze, Lippstadt 2000. White to move and win. P ConNers looks like a misprint, but it stood for Parallel Controlled Conspiracy Number Search, the only computer to win a grandmaster tournament in the brief period when machines competed against humans.  Here it defeats a former world woman champion.

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