Final round about to start

The 11th and final round of the Istanbul Chess Olympiad will start in another 1.5 hours.

Both Malaysia's Men and Women team are doing well. The women are leading Group D with Turkey2016 team. The Turkish team is playing Vietnam and I predict they will lose. This means that our girls can win Group D with a draw with Estonia. The Estonians have two WIM on the first two boards so our girls have their work cut out for them. Camilia Joharia is aiming for WFM title by drawing her last game.

We are paired with the Thai team. On paper this should be a win for us. Lim Zhuo Ren is gunning for a IM norm. The regulations for norms are quite vague and can lead to different interpretations. If he is allowed to raise one of his opponents rating to the IM rating floor than a draw might suffice. To be on the safe side, he has been told to win.

The championship will  be decided in this round as well. The three leaders, China, Russia and Armenia have 17 match points just one point ahead of Ukraine. Ukraine have to beat China on top table to finish with a medal. Armenia plays Hungary and Russia plays Germany.

Russia should win their match and its up to China and Armenia to catch up and decide the medals on tie-breaks. A win for China should give them the trophy as their tie-breaks is the highest amongst the three leaders.