GM Gelashvili (NY) vs GM Becerra (MIA) 1-0 finishes 20th Place in the GOTY Contest

GM Gelashvili defeated a very strong opponent with a nice bind together with an interesting exchange sacrifice, but unfortunately the judges collectively thought higher of other games, and he will have to rely on his other entry to bring him into the Top Five again.

This is the first part in a series of articles which will count down to revealing what game was voted as the 2013 USCL Game of the Year. The entrants are the thirteen Games of the Week along with the seven Wildcards (full list). There are six judges who ranked the games from 1st to 20th. If a game is ranked in 1st place by a judge, it receives 20 points, if it’s ranked 2nd place it receives 19 points, and so on with 20th place receiving 1 point, and the games are then ranked by their total number of points. If there is a tie at a certain total, whichever amongst those games have higher individual rankings will win on tiebreak (e.g., a game which gets 1st + 4th ranking is higher than a game which gets 2nd + 3rd).

The six judges are:

GM Alejandro Ramirez
GM Alex Yermolinsky
IM Jake Kleiman
FM Ingvar Johannesson
FM Alisa Melekhina
FM Ron Young

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20th Place: GM Tamaz Gelashvili (NY) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 1-0

After a long squeeze, GM Gelashvili finished the game off with the attractive tactic 57. Bg6+!, scoring a nice win against a very strong opponent

GM Alex Yermolinsky (12th Place, 9 Points): An I’ve-seen-this-before positional squeeze is lightened up by a nice exchange sac in the final stage that introduces a theme of domination.

FM Ingvar Johannesson (12th Place, 9 Points): A nice squeeze by Gelashvili against a very strong opponent. I wonder though if the exchange sacrifice was simply unnecessary and gave Black chances to hold. And these thoughts of mine drag it down a little bit in my rankings.

FM Alisa Melekhina (13th Place, 8 Points): Gelashvili neutralized one of the USCL’s most dynamic players, never relinquishing him from the vice grip of the clamp structure. The opening featured flubs from both players: the curious 8. Nbd2 from Gelashvili instead of h3 to prevent Qh5, and 8… Nbd7 from Becerra instead of the direct 8… Qh5, playing for the thematic … Bh3.

After exchanging Queens – which no player on the Black side of a KID wants– Gelashvili’s light-squared Bishop was a monster. It cut off all of Black’s pieces from entering the game at all. Still, 41. Rxd6+ was a bit reckless. Black was already paralyzed at that point; something like Rf2 would have finished him off. Overall, it was a methodical positional bind that made me queasy to watch from Black’s point of view.

FM Ron Young (14th Place, 7 Points): If it became commonplace for White to offer a Queen swap on move 10, without even any immediate structural advantage ensuing, and going on to beat a strong GM, there would soon be no more chess openings books, and nothing to talk about at dinner parties. An oddly abrupt finish with the 57. Bg6+ trick actually happening, but I’m sure White was up to the clunky Rook ending.

IM Jake Kleiman (15th Place, 6 Points): This looks like a clean win by Tamaz against Julio who is well known for his endgame technique. However, Tamaz’s play was quite natural, so it’s hard to award it a higher ranking.

GM Alejandro Ramirez (20th Place, 1 Point): The truth is that White’s fancy sacrifice simply made his task much harder. Black was already tied up and the simple maneuvering of the Rook to the h-file would have finished his opponent off.

Total Score of Gelashvili vs Becerra: (20th Place, 40 Points)

Stay tuned for nineteen more such articles as the field shrinks by one game almost every day to see which of the following games will be the 2013 Game of the Year!

Week 1: GM Joel Benjamin (NJ) vs GM Pascal Charbonneau (NY) 1-0 Article

Week 2: GM Pascal Charbonneau (NY) vs GM Robert Hungaski (MAN) 1-0 Article

Week 3: IM Andranik Matikozyan (LA) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 0-1 Article

Week 4: GM Emil Anka (SEA) vs FM Tom Bartell (PHI) 0-1 Article

Week 5: IM Dmitry Schneider (MAN) vs GM Joel Benjamin (NJ) 0-1 Article

Week 6: IM Marc Esserman (BOS) vs GM Tamaz Gelashvili (NY) 0-1 Article

Week 7: FM Eric Rodriguez (MIA) vs IM Irina Krush (NY) 1-0 Article

Week 8: GM Conrad Holt (DAL) vs IM Jonathan Schroer (CAR) 1-0 Article

Week 9: GM Giorgi Margvelashvili (DAL) vs GM Ben Finegold (STL) 1/2-1/2 Article

Week 10: John Michael Burke (NJ) vs NM Ryan Goldenberg (MAN) 0-1 Article

Quarterfinals: GM Conrad Holt (DAL) vs GM Julio Becerra (MIA) 0-1 Article

Semifinals: GM Sam Shankland (NE) vs GM Tamaz Gelashvili (NY) 1-0 Article