2011 World Youth
Awonder Liang takes gold and Ruifeng Li takes silver at the 2011 World Youth Championship
By GM JOHN FEDOROWICZ F
or the first time the World Youth Chess Championship was played in South America. Previous tournaments were played in Spain, Greece, Turkey, France, The Republic of Georgia, and Vietnam. This year’s event was hosted from November 17th to the 27th by the Brazilian town Caldas Novas, famous for it’s water parks and hot springs. I traveled with Aviv Friedman, Armen Ambartsoumian, Gennady Zaitchik and Michael Khodarkovsky.
We always leave a few days early just in case we encounter travel snafus. JFK airport got us off to a bad start with our flight depart-
ing two hours late. We made up some time on our way to Sao Paulo, but not enough to save our connection. After a seven-hour wait in Sao Paulo we finally made it to Goiânia where we were met by a small car. With poor Aviv cramped into a backseat we made our way to Caldas Novas in a driving rain storm. We conversed in Spanish with our enthusiastic young driver. GM Joel Benjamin had bigger problems as his ride from Brasilia to Caldas Novas failed to find him. The tired grandmaster arrived about 10 hours later than he should’ve after some unwanted adventures, but in one piece. Just like a year ago in Halkidiki, Greece, we had our largest delegation ever. With over 60 players, it was about 20 more than last
year. Also like last year, the group was dominated by our under 8 and under 10 (30 players), making for a very inexperienced team something like we are used to. Our two highest-rated players were Eric Rosen, 2305 FIDE, and Michael Vilenchuk at 2219 FIDE. Despite this we felt we still had good medal chances. Good experienced coaches of course can help a lot and we had quite a strong crew. In addition to this author and my four travel companions we were helped by GMs Joel Benjamin, Nick de Firmian, Sam Palat- nik, Yury Shulman, and IM Andranik Matikozyan. I can’t imagine any country coming too close to this staff of coaches. In addition, Yury Shulman and Shaun Smith helped out with Justus Williams, James Black and Rochelle Ballantyne who were sponsored by Chess In the Schools. The coaches were responsible for six players each with 20 to 30 minutes of preparation time. Thanks to organ- izer GM Darcy Lima and the Thermas di Roma Hotel for providing us with a team room; with 10 coaches we needed a good-sized room and we got one. We gathered there for our all important post-game analysis. The way Team USA is set up, as in past world youths, our strong medal contenders come from relatively unknown young-
sters. This year was no different. Wisconsin’s Awonder Liang dominated the boys under 8 section. He started with seven wins then had a draw followed by a last round loss to Ram Aravind L N of India. His tiebreaks were so strong he had clinched the gold medal before the last game. I chose these two Awonder games because he won the games while exhibiting different styles. His round five game took a positional path while his round seven win flashed big tactics (with help from his opponent).
Sicilian Defense,
Scheveningen Variation (B83) Awonder Liang (FIDE 1872, USA) CM Matvey Pak (FIDE 1860, RUS) World Youth 2011 (5), 11.22.2011
1. e4 This is my favorite game from Awon-
der’s event. For such a young player he showed a Karpovian positional sense.
1. ... c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 e6 6. Be3 Be7 7. Be2 Nc6 8. 0-0 0-0 9. Qd2
Typical of the Boleslavsky variation is 9. f4 e5 10. Nb3 exf4 11. Bxf4 Be6.
9. ... e5?! This move can be played if White’s
pawn is on f4, when Black would secure e5 for a knight.
10. Nb3 Be6 11. Rad1 Attacking the d5 point with positional
ideas similar to the Sveshnikov with 11.
uschess.org
Bg5!? is more to the point. 11. ... a5!?
r+-wq-trk+ +p+-vlpzpp -+nzplsn-+ zp-+-zp-+- -+-+P+-+ +NsN-vL-+- PzPPwQLzPPzP +-+R+RmK-
After 11. ... a5 Black should charge this pawn down
to a3.
12. f3 Black’s main idea is 12. a4 Nb4 playing
for a fast d5; 12. a3!? slowing down Black’s a5-pawn keeps things under control.
12. ... Re8?! Black keeps playing moves without
finding a constructive plan. 12. ... a4 13. Nc1 a3 14. b3 Nb4 gives Black good coun- terplay.
13. Kh1 h6?!
Black’s best is again 13. ... a4 14. Nc1 a3 15. b3 Nb4. 14. a3! As we’ve seen in previous notes, it’s impor-
tant to keep Black from pushing to a3. 14. ... a4?
The pawn on a4 is easy pickings.
15. Nc1 Qa5 16. Nb5 White sees that the trade of queens
leaves Black with two targets on a4 and d6.
16. ... Qxd2 17. Rxd2 Red8 18. Rfd1 Ne8 19. Nc3! Bf6 20. Bb5 Nd4 21. Bxe8 Taking with 21. Bxa4!? looks like it
Chess Life — February 2012 31
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76