2015 Malaysian Chess Festival

The 12th edition of this Festival ended Sunday. As in past years, the players were treated to a sumptuous dinner followed by the prize ceremony.

I partipated in the KLK Seniors section as in past years. I have always come second but this year was a stronger field with two grandmasters and a strong IM from Indonesia. My final placing was 5th good for the Best Malaysian prize.

The winner was Dimitry Kayumov, also a previous champion. This year there was stiff challenge from Russian GM Fominyh and IM Ronny Gunawan from Indonesia. In the end Kayumov drew with both and won the rest of his games for a 8/9 score. Fominyh came in second as he was held to a draw from Filipino Bagamasbad Efren. Ronny Gunawan took the third placing with solid play despite being away from serious competition for over twenty years.

In round six I bungled this won ending.

Jimmy Liew - Dang Tat Thang

I was down to increments and continued poorly. The simple win is to defend the f-pawn and advance with the king, 39. Rh4 Ke7 40. Kc3 Ke6 41. Kd4 Kf5 42.
Rh6 and white will pick up the queen-side pawns. I thought I played a clever move.

 39. e6  Expecting to pick up Black's b-pawn.

39... a6 Totally overlooked by me. The win is more difficult now as pawn exchanges on the king-side is now inevitable. The line is 41. exf7 Kxf7 42. Rh7+! Kg6  (If the king goes to the back rank he is cut off forever and will lose) 43. Ra7 b4 44. Rxa6+ Kf5 45. a4! Maintains a pawn for an easy win.
Black's pawns on c4 and b4 are easily blocked by the white king.

40 f5?? After this the draw is secured for black.

41... fxe6 42. fxe6 b4 43. axb4 (43. a4 Nc5 44. Rc8 Nxa4 45. Rxc4 Kxe6 is an easy draw. )
43... Nxb4+ 44. Kc3 Nd5+ 45. Kxc4 Nf4 46. Ra8 Kxe6 47. Rxa6+ Ke5 48. Ra1 Ke4 and white no longer can win.

The Malaysian Open was won by Jahongir Vakhidov. He has been playing here for a number of years as an untitled player but is now a full fledged GM.  He won the first four rounds but slowed down in the last three with consecutive draws. This allowed a number of players to catch up and he only won on tie-break.

It is clear that Malaysian players are streets behind the rest in the region. This is more glaring in the Challengers section where the top two seeds are locals but they could not challenge the unrated Filipinos and Indonesians. Philippines swept most of the top prizes.

The only bright spot I could see was local lass Ho Chen Ee, rated a lowly 1461 scored 6/9 against mostly higher rated players to finish 18th and gain a whopping 160 ELO points.

Full chess results:

Malaysia Challenge

Malaysia Open

KLK Seniors

Writing the Veresov

When I was offered to write a book on the Veresov for Everyman Chess, I had no idea how much time I was committing myself to this book. After all I had been playing the opening all my life; so how difficult could it be? I only started examining the Move by Move format after signing the contract. This is a question and answer format pioneered by Everyman Chess which is quite different to any chess book I have encountered.

All in, it took a year to get a first draft out and another four months before the book was ready for publication.

So what goes into producing an opening book? Roughly the steps I went through were:

1. Sieve through as many games as possible from various sources.
2. Decide which games were suitable for inclusion. It did not matter who the players were or what format it was played under (blitz, rapid, online etc), as long as I thought it was of some value to readers.
3. Going through my own analysis and notes for inclusion.
4. Structuring the chapters. I started with less common lines before moving on to the main lines.
5. I mainly did all the work in Chessbase and using an external program to engine-check the games and analysis.
6. Finally, transfer everything from Chessbase to Microsoft Word
7. Prepared the List of Games at the end of the book. This was very trying because as I checked my work, I kept making changes and everytime  I had to update the page numbers for every game!

Still , it was a great experience and I learned a lot about writing on chess openings. So much that I have contracted on a second book!

Copies of the book can be purchased from me directly by contacting me at cmliew@gmail.com or cmliewjimmy@yahoo.com. Alternatively my mobile is 6019-6571628. The book is priced at RM98 plus RM10 for postage.

Lessons on rigging the deck

First, read Peter Long's article today.

I can confirm that a part of Peter's accusations at MCF is true.

The MCF President and his men are trying to keep those affiliates who are known to be "unfriendly" away from the coming elections and according to Peter, one of the tactics will be to suspend these affiliates thereby preventing them from voting at the coming AGM.

I know at least one affiliate which is eager to pay up whatever is outstanding. The MCF President and Secretary thwarts this by just refusing to issue any invoice. Attempts to contact them are just ignored.

At the last election in 2013, the President and his entire committee were allowed to vote. This is unprecedented and unheard off. The normal practice is for all MCF council and committee to be discharged from their positions at the start of election process. They thus have no further roles to play in the proceedings unless they are also the official delegate for an affiliate.

The votes from the President's men helped to beat off his challenger at that AGM. The big mistake by the challenger and his supporters were to allow this illegal voting to happen. They should have just walked out even though it meant the incumbent would retain his presidency. That way they could have challenged the election process in court.

It is a fact that the majority of the committee will support the incumbent as they either owe their positions to him or stand to benefit from their positions and wants to continue in office. This explains why the recent appointments and  shuffling in positions. It is merely to beef up their vote bank. If you are appointed to your position by the President it is likely that you will want to see that same President in place for the next two years, so you will vote accordingly.

Saving Malaysian Chess

My favourite TV series is Game of Thrones which is based on the books written by George R. R. Martin. One often repeated saying in the series is “Winter is coming”, a reference to the dark and difficult times that will come after summer ends. In this fantasy world, seasons lasts years not months.

This is Sam, one of the main characters in GOT, I kind of taken a liking to his character, though Mr. Martin keeps killing off characters whom the viewers starts identifying with , with startling regularity. It is quite annoying. Thankfully, Sam has survived till the end of season five.

Anyway, winter may be coming in Season 6 for Game of Thrones but Malaysian chess has already been entrenched in this “winter” for many years.

A few years ago I wrote a piece on the future of Malaysian chess.

That was five years ago. Till today I see nothing has changed, Malaysian chess is still floundering and regressing. In my post above I argued that the Malaysian Chess Federation is to be blamed and its leadership should be held accountable.

What has the current MCF President done to promote the game? The answer is Nothing. So why does one so desperately cling on to this post that does not come with any obvious benefit other than the title of President? He is not a chess lover nor a chess player as far as we know.

What contributions did he make to Malaysian chess since becoming President? The federation’s finances are still in a mess. For a while our players were even taken off the FIDE Elo Rating List due to our federation being in arrears (this has since been rectified). Every two years MCF have to go hat in hand looking for someone to pick up the tab for sending a team to the Chess Olympiads. In 2014 MCF only managed to get enough money to send a men’s team. Our women’s team which had participated in 2010 Khanty-Mansiysk and 2012 Istanbul were left out.

The federation has effectively been running on auto-pilot for many years. Recently I read a interesting piece of news here.

If I remember correctly, only the posts of Treasurer, Secretary and Auditors are appointed positions. The rest are elected during the AGM every two years. Basically the MCF committee has now started electing themselves to different positions without holding any EGM. I am unsure if this is constitutional but this year is an election year so why start shuffling positions when we are just a few months short of an AGM in an election year.

The reason I am writing this post is that I have been informed that Dato’ Tan Chin Nam, who has stayed out of the Malaysian Chess Federation since stepping down in 2005 in favor of the current incumbent, Tan Sri Ramli bin Ngah Talib, has decided to return as MCF President. When I heard this news I did a double-take. I had to check with my source that I had heard him correctly.

My first thoughts. Why is Dato’ Tan making a comeback to the President post? And what will he bring with him to the table?

It cannot be denied that the man has very deep pockets but this is not his most best qualification for the post of President. He has a deep love of the game. It is common for him to play at least one game daily. He makes it a point to be updated on what is going on in the world of chess locally as well as internationally. He is genuinely trying to promote the game not only amongst chessplayers but also others who depends on chess part-time or full-time like arbiters and coaches.

He has good intentions but what else? MCF like any other organization, cannot function as well without funds. Dato’ Tan understands this very well and has promised not only to ensure that MCF have the necessary finances to function and promote the game. The state affiliates will not be left out but they will also benefit. I have the privilege of chatting with him on more than a few ocassions and he has shared some of his plans with me over the past year. 

In the works are plans to hold nation-wide series of Grand Prix style tournaments and possibly IM/GM tournaments. There are plans to set up a chess center in Mid Valley Megamall which will be used for chess training and also act as the Malaysian Chess Federation office. It will also be a place for chess lovers to come together to socialise and play chess.

The question is whether there will be a new invigorated Malaysian Chess Federation after the forthcoming elections. A federation that can put forward looking policies in place and a rejuvenated chess program. Or will we see the same tired faces re-elected and we all continue to wither in this “chess winter”?

Malaysian Chess Festival 2015

I have received the following announcement for the Malaysian Chess Festival for 2015. This year it will be held in September.

The Dato' Arthur Tan Chess Centre (DAT Chess Centre) will be organizing the 12^th Malaysian Chess Festival 2015 as follows:

 

18 - 19 September 2015

ASTRO Merdeka Rapid Team Chess Championship

 

20 September 2015

6th SWENSEN's Age Group Chess Championship

 

20 - 28 September 2015 (FIDE Rated / Title Tournament)

12th IGB Dato' Arthur Tan International Malaysian Open Chess Championship

6th KLK Tan Sri Lee Loy Seng International Seniors Open Chess Championship

Malaysia Chess Challenge

 

Entry Forms are attached. Please register early so that we can accept you! Last year we had to reject many entries especially Merdeka and Swensen because of space constraints.

My email address has also changed, please use all the emails in your reply. Thank you

 

Hamid

 

Email: ahamchess@yahoo.com

Email: aham4you@gmail.com

Email: datcc@outlook.com

 

Malaysian Masters 2015 (Women): Najiha victorious

The 2015 Malaysian Masters (Women) started off today with ten participants in a round robin format. The tournament will be played over five days starting today till Wednesday , 3rd June 2015 at Dewan Ho Koh Chye at the Olympic Hotel in Jalan Hang Jebat.

The new Masters Champion is Nur Najiha Azman Hisham with a clear half point lead over the rest of the field. Najiha defeated Camilia in the final round to tally 7.5 points.

Tan Li Ting managed to win her last round against Alia Bakri but could only come second once Najiha won. The other front runners , Nur Nabila and Puteri Rifqah Fahada also won and maintained their standings as third and fourth respectively.

At the end of the tournament, there was a simple closing with MCF Secretary giving out the certificates to all the players. The trophy will be awarded to Nur Najiha during the Malaysian Chess Festival scheduled for September.

The full crosstable below:

Now the game which decided the champion with some light notes.

[Event "Malaysian Masters 2015 (Women)"]
[Site "Wisma OCM, Kuala Lumpur"]
[Date "2015.06.03"]
[Round "9.3"]
[White "Johari, Camilia"]
[Black "Azman Hisham, Nur Najiha"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "A00"]
[WhiteElo "1924"]
[BlackElo "1957"]
[EventDate "2015.05.30"]
[EventRounds "9"]


1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. Qc2 O-O 5. a3 Bxc3+ 6. Qxc3 Ne4 7. Qc2 f5 8.
Nf3 d6 9. e3 Nd7 10. Bd3 Ndf6 11. O-O g5 !? 

This aggressive move is more show than real threat. It is hard to believe that Black can whip up an attack on the king-side without help from white.  

12. Nd2 d5 13. b4 Ng4 14. Nf3

14. Nxe4 dxe4 15. Be2 will show black that the advance on the king-side with 11...g5
is uncalled for.

14... c6 15. Ne5 Nxe5 16. dxe5 g4 17. b5

Again 17. Bxe4 dxe4 and Black has no attack although the opposite colored bishops could be good
for a draw.

17... Ng5 18. a4 Rf7 19. Ba3 Rg7 20. bxc6 bxc6 21. cxd5 cxd5 22.
Qc5 Bb7 23. Rab1 Qe8 24. Qd4 Qh5 25. Kh1 Kh8 26. Rb3 ?

Prepares to double rooks on the b-file but black has been amassing pieces on the king-side and a
sacrifice on f3 is coming.

 26... Rag8 27. Rxb7?

White was in serious time trouble with less than two minutes on the clock and facing serious problems with her king. But still giving up the exchange is as good as resigning. The only defence is 27. Rbb1 in order to answer Nf3 28. gxf3 (There is an interesting mate after 28. Qf4 g3!  29. h3 Qxh3+ 30. gxh3 g2 mate) 28... gxf3 with 29. Rg1 Rg2 30. Rxg2 Rxg2 31. Qf4  and the king-side holds and white has his own threats on the b-file for counter-play

 27... Rxb7 28. Be2 Ne4 29. Kg1 Qh4 30. g3 Qh5 31. Rc1 Ng5 32. Qd3 Nf3+ 33. Bxf3 gxf3 34. Qf1 Qg5 35. a5 h5 36. a6

36. Qa6 with the idea of Qxe6 and Qf6+ exchanging queens was the only chance
not to lose outright.

36... Rh7 0-1

White cannot prevent the opening of the h-file with h5-h4 and so resigned.

Malaysian Masters 2015 (Women): Who will be champion?

The 2015 Malaysian Masters (Women) is a ten player round robin format. The tournament will be played over five days starting Saturday 30th May till Wednesday , 3rd June 2015 at the Dewan Ho Koh Chye at the Olympic Hotel in Jalan Hang Jebat.

Today is the final round of the Masters. Nur Najiha is in the lead with 6.5 points , half a point over the second place Tan Li Ting. A loss for Najiha and a win for Li TIng could change the eventual winner.

Final round pairings

Najiha faces Camilia and needs only a draw to ensure a tie for first at the minimum. This may seem easy as Camilia has drawn all eight games (!) but I believe Camilia will be trying to win in order to get a place in this year's squad.

Tan Li Ting plays Alia Bakri and both will be trying to win, the former in order to have realistic chances of finishing first and the latter also needs the win to have some slim chance in making the squad.

Tan Li Ting

Camilia

 If things go her way, she could be champion.














Camilia, undefeated but also winless, unless she can change that in the final round.

Melanie v. Nithya

Nithya (picture above) is playing Melanie and needs to win to have any chances to make the squad

Najihah  Mohd.Saufi

Najihaha is probably the most relaxed player in the last round,

Malaysian Masters 2015 (Women): Round 5

The 2015 Malaysian Masters (Women) is a ten player round robin format. The tournament will be played over five days starting Saturday 30th May till Wednesday , 3rd June 2015 at the Dewan Ho Koh Chye at the Olympic Hotel in Jalan Hang Jebat.

Round five was a repeat of round three where results were concerned with four white wins and a draw.

Camilia could have made it a five white wins if she won the following ending.

Camilia - Nur Nabila, Round 5

Now 51 h4 would have won since knights are extremely bad at stopping rook pawns. Instead she played

51. g4?!! fxg4 52. hxg4 Kc5 53. f4 perhaps expecting the two passed pawns to win easily.  Kd6 54. Kf6 Kd7  If the king reaches the queening squares the draw is unavoidable so 55. Kf7 Ne6 56. f5 Ng5+ 57. Kg6 Nf3 58. f6 Ke6 59. g5 Nxg5 1/2-1/2

The top three in the standings won so the positions are unchanged. The standings after round five:

Malaysian Masters 2015 (Women): Round 4 highlights

The 2015 Malaysian Masters (Women) is a ten player round robin format. The tournament will be played over five days starting Saturday 30th May till Wednesday , 3rd June 2015 at the Dewan Ho Koh Chye at the Olympic Hotel in Jalan Hang Jebat.

Three draws were featured today, two of them quiet affairs with both white and black players trading pieces to equal endings. 

However, the following should have ended in a win for black.

Melanie Koo - Tan Li Ting, Round 4

Despite the aggresive white king position, black's outside passed pawn will decide the game. At the end of the tournament, Li Ting will surely regret giving away the half point with her next move.

 50. ... b5 ??
This does not work since the black king is too far from the king-side.

Black gains the opposition and wins after 50... f6 51. f5 (51. Ke6 b5 52. axb5 axb5 53. Kd5 Kb6) 51...
Kd7 52. Kc4 Kc6 53. Kd4 Kd6

51. axb5 axb5 52. Kc5 g5 53. Kxb5 
This is the easiest way to a draw although 53. fxg5 is also possible after 53... Kd7 54. Kxb5 Kd6 55. Kc4 Ke5 56. Kc5! Kf4 57. Kd6 Kxg5 58. Ke5 f6+ 59. Ke6 Kg6 60. Ke7 Kg5 61. Ke6 and no progress can be made.

53... Kd6 54. Kc4 gxf4 55.Kd4 1/2-1/2

Replay the game below

Najihah Mohd Saufi - Nur Najiha Azman Hisham, Round 4

The game started as a Smith-Morra Gambit with white catching the black king in the centre. Now white has a great chance to finish the game. She starts correctly with

28. Bxf6 Qxf6 
28... Bxf6 29. Bxd5! crashes through since exd5 30. Re7+ wins the black queen.

29. Qxg4 Qg5 30. Qf3+ Bf6

The position is critical for black and white should look for the killer blows. The most obvious is
31. Rxe6 Rxe6 32. Bxd5 Rc1 (the only move to avoid complete collapse) 33. Bxe6+ Kg7 and White has two pawns and despite the opposite colored bishops can still try to win due to the exposed black king.

Instead white can take advantage of the over-loaded black queen. 31. h4! Qxh4 32. Rxe6 Rxe6 33. Qxd5  and White has a winning attack.

 31. Qe2 This is less decisive but white is still in a very strong position because of the exposed black king 31... Rcc6 32. Qxb5 d4

A desperate try to exchange queens. After 33. Qb7+ Kf8 34. Rxe6 Rxe6 35. Bxe6 Rxe6 36. Qc8+ Kg7 37. Qxe6 white wins comfortably but instead she blunders overlooking her queen.

33. Rxe6 ??  33... Qxb5 34. Rxc6+ Kg6 35. Ba4 Qb4 36. Bc2+ Kf7 37. Rc7+ Be7 38. Rcxe7+ Qxe7 39. Rxe7+ Kxe7 40. f4 Rb6 41. b3 Rc6 42. Be4 Re6 43. Bf3 d3 44. Kf2 Kd6 45. g4 d2 46. Be2 Kd5 47. f5 Re8 48. h4 Kd4 49. g5 hxg5 50. hxg5 Re5 51. g6 Rxf5+ 0-1

Replay the game below

Malaysian Masters 2015 (Women): Round 3

The 2015 Malaysian Masters (Women) is a ten player round robin format. The tournament will be played over five days starting Saturday 30th May till Wednesday , 3rd June 2015 at the Dewan Ho Koh Chye at the Olympic Hotel in Jalan Hang Jebat.

Round three was a most bloody day with four out of the five games being decisive and white on the winning side.

Najihah Mohd Saufi - Alia Bakri, Round 3

 This simple looking ending is not that simple and Black lost to a much lower rated player after 31...Rc6 ?

The best chance was 31...Re7 and if 32. Rc5 to defend the pawn with 32...Rd7 and then bring the king to the defence of the d5 pawn.

32. Rc5! Now black is forced to exchange and give white a potential passed pawn on the queen-side
 Rxc5 33. dxc5
Kf6 34. b4 Ke6 

Despite pawns are equal, black is worse as he cannot create his own passed pawn on the king-side due to the white pawn on e3. Now 34... Ke5 35. b5 and 35...d5 is not possible because of 36 exd4+ Kxd4 37 c6 queening the pawn.

35. a4 a6 36. b5 a5 37. h4 Ke5 38. g4 fxg4+ 39. Kxg4 h6 40. Kf3 Ke6 41. Kf4 g5+ 

Black is in zugzwang. 41...Kf6 loses to 42 c6 bxc6 43 b6.

42. hxg5 hxg5+ 43. Kxg5 Ke5 44. Kg4 Ke4 45. c6 bxc6 46. bxc6 Kxe3 47. c7 d4 48. c8=Q d3 49. Qc5+ Ke2 50. Qxa5 1-0

After winning a pawn, Nabila made a horrible blunder with 31...Rxc2?? overlooking an in-between move. It always pays to check every possible capture!

Camilia had the better pawn structure though it is not easy to find a good plan. The game was agreed drawn.