Australian Championship Games

[pballard]

All the dgt games are now finished. Lane and Moylan did well to draw with black versus Chandler and Zhao, while Johansen's king got stuck in the middle against Smerdon. Even without queens, he was forced to drop material. A GM norm now a real possibility for David.

So what's the story with Moylan-Zhao (assuming dgt is correct saying draw after move 24)? Looks to me a very unbalanced position... both too scared to play on?

[Garvinator]

So what's the story with Moylan-Zhao (assuming dgt is correct saying draw after move 24)? Looks to me a very unbalanced position... both too scared to play on?

I just checked the scoresheets and move orders against the dgt display and the dgt display is correct. Result is a draw.

[pax]

Moulthun got mated in the middle of the board by Q+B vs R+B(opp)+2P. Materially, it looks like it ought to be a draw, but on the board it was just impossible to see the black king getting to safety. And I suspect the opposite coloured bishop is more of a hindrance in that sort of position.

Big result for Laura with black vs Zhao.

And Smurf seems to be rolling all over these GMs (though he has had three whites). I guess the big matchup on Monday will be Chandler-Smerdon. It looks to me that a performance rating of about 2480 for the next five games will get him a GM norm.

[Trizza]

So what's the story with Moylan-Zhao (assuming dgt is correct saying draw after move 24)? Looks to me a very unbalanced position... both too scared to play on?

Black had only 6 mins to white's 43, but white's compensation for the pawn seems a little nebulous. Maybe Zhao didn't want to risk it after the loss yesterday. Moylan would probably be satisfied with a black draw versus an IM, given her clock position.

[Trizza]

Moulthun got mated in the middle of the board by Q+B vs R+B(opp)+2P. Materially, it looks like it ought to be a draw, but on the board it was just impossible to see the black king getting to safety. And I suspect the opposite coloured bishop is more of a hindrance in that sort of position.

When a king is exposed opposite coloured bishops are actually very good for the attacker (though having an unopposed queen also helps!).

[pballard]

(Moved from Juniors thread).

Is there a rule about not resigning versus a Song?

Check out Raymond Song-Bird in Rd 4. Bird played on for seven moves after Song queened to go Q+R up (vs K+3P - it was clear the pawns weren't going anywhere). He appears to have resigned 3 moves from mate.

I've been known to play on longer than I should when I'm totally shell-shocked and can't believe I'm about to lose. Given that Raymond is - what? 11 - perhaps that's what happened there.

[arosar]

I notice that downloadable PDF of bulletins are now available on the official site. They include analysis by Davidovic from the 2nd issue onwards. This is really very good service provided by the organisers - quite a big step from that bloody other tournament on some dump somewhere.

AR

[ElevatorEscapee]

I noticed that the DGT for the Sheldrick Duxbury game was quickly corrected.

I was watching it, initially it showed 1.e4 d5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Bc4 Qa5 (The last two moves left me scratching my head... why would White put the Bishop en prise, why wouldn't Black take it?).

It was just updated to the more believable line:
1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qa5 4.Nf3 Nf6 5.Bc4 c6

[Alan Shore]

And the boards have died yet again...

[Kevin Bonham]

Probably in disgust at being forced to relay five Sicilians on the top six boards. At least Ftacnik-Wohl is something different.

I've just had some apparently fresh moves on my screen, but is Sheldrick-Duxbury really still on move 6?

Actually it looks frozen from here too now - at moves 10, 20, 11, 17, 6, 11, 13 all with Black to move.

[Kevin Bonham]

New moves now. If it was a freeze it was a fairly short one.

[shaun]

Seems OK here.
Schmaltz v Zhao is interesting at move 21. Fruit 2.1 is suggesting a piece sacrifice for White with bxa6.

[jase]

DGT boards are all in working order, albeit with some manual intervention when a piece suddenly disappears off the radar.

However the TOMA software is presently not uploading to our website. We have just installed a program that will upload data every 5 minutes, as a back-up procedure, and hope to have the TOMA gear operating on all cylinders again asap.

FYI Obst - Guthrie was an 11 move draw. I think they played about 10 minutes of chess. All other Championship games remain in progress.

[Kevin Bonham]

Humphrey-Song has been drawn according to the PGN.

[Alan Shore]

Humphrey-Song has been drawn according to the PGN.

Well the pain is over... Sheldrick - Duxbury 1-0

Edit: Oy, KB, edited post!