For the eighth year in a row Baden Baden won the Schachbundesliga. Playing with Peter Svidler on board one, the team secured another championship with two rounds to spare on Friday thanks to a 5-3 win against SG Trier. Eventually Baden Baden clinched the title by winning all their matches in the season 2012-2013.
The figures say it all: 15 matches, 30 points, 89 board points. In recent years there hasn't been much doubt about Baden Baden's sovereignty in German chess, and this season there wasn't any.
The last three rounds were played last Friday, Saturday and Sunday with all sixteen clubs gathering in one location: the Schwetzingen Palace in Schwetzingen, a town situated in the northwest of Baden-Württemberg, around 10 km southwest of Heidelberg and 15 km southeast of Mannheim.
Before this season finale, Baden Baden was already five points head of runner-up SV Mülheim Nord, a team with three 2700 players in their season's line-up: Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, David Navara and Boris Grachev. Baden Baden even had Vishy Anand, Magnus Carlsen and Levon Aronian on the list, but of these three only the latter played two games in February.
However, last weekend the winning team did come to Schwetzingen with a big name: Peter Svidler, who had tied for third with Aronian at the FIDE Candidates' Tournament only days before. (Svidler had played two Bundesliga games in the last week of February as well.) In Friday's round, the grandmaster from St Petersburg drew with Black against David Howell in an Alapin Sicilian. The next day he won an interesting game against Pentala Harikrisha, who sacrificed his queen at an early stage:
In the 15th and last round on Sunday, Svidler met none other than Anatoly Karpov, who played his second game of the season for Hockenheim. (On Saturday the 12th World Champion gave a simul.) Their encounter must have been the most symmetrical game they had ever played:
Returning to the subject of queen sacrifices, this game, played in round 13 in the match Eppingen-Hockenheim, was also quite nice:
According to the regulations, SF Berlin, SV Griesheim, SC Forchheim and SK Norderstedt have regelated to the second Bundesliga. However, the champions of the North, South, West and East regions sometimes wish to stay in the 2. league instead of playing in the Bundesleague. In those cases the numbers 2 or 3 of the regional league can promote, if they want. However, there cannot be two teams of the same club playing in the top league. All in all, especially for Berlin there is still hope. In May, when all matches have been played, things will be decided.
No comments:
Post a Comment