Chess - The Scotsman 17/01/2012

“SUPERGRANDMASTER” tournaments don’t always deliver the excitement the name would imply, but the Dutch hamlet of Wijk aan Zee has always lived up to its billing, with the 74th Tata Steel Chess Tournament now under way there, which will be the focus of our coverage for the rest of the month.

The tournament goes back to 1938 when it started life as a works tournament for the Dutch steel giant Hoogovens, involving just four players. The only year the tournament wasn’t played was in 1945, but the next year it went “international” in nearby Beverwijk, before moving to its spiritual home in Wijk aan Zee in 1968.

Since then it has went through two incarnations with Corus – forged from the merger between British Steel and Hoogovens – from 2000 to 2010; and now the Indian conglomerate of Tata Steel, following their acquisition of Corus. But through all these changes there has been one constant factor: and this has been that the tournament has gone from strength to strength with each edition.

The 74th edition is one of the strongest on record, with the full line-up (based in ranking order from the September 2011 rating list that set the field) being: Magnus Carlsen, Levon Aronian, Sergey Karjakin, Veselin Topalov, Vassily Ivanchuk, Vugar Gashimov, Gata Kamsky, Hikaru Nakamura, Teimour Radjabov, Boris Gelfand, Anish Giri, Fabiano Caruana, David Navara and Loek van Wely.

S Karjakin - L Aronian

74th Tata Steel GMA, (1)

Ruy Lopez

1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Ba4 Nf6 5 0–0 Be7 6 d3 b5 7 Bb3 0–0 8 a4 b4 9 Nbd2 Bc5 10 h3 d6 11 c3 Rb8 12 Re1 Re8 13 a5 Ba7 14 Nf1 Ne7 15 Ng3 Ng6 16 d4 h6 17 Bc2 c5 18 dxe5 dxe5 19 Bd3 Be6 20 Bxa6 c4 21 Ra4 Qc7 22 cxb4 Bxf2+ 23 Kxf2 Qa7+ 24 Be3 Qxa6 25 Kg1 Red8 26 Qc1 Rd3 27 Rd1 Rb3 28 Qd2 Kh7 29 Kh2 Rb7 30 Qf2 Bd7 31 Ra2 R7xb4 32 Nh5 Bc8 33 Nxf6+ Qxf6 34 Kg1 Bb7 35 Nd2 Qxf2+ 36 Bxf2 Rd3 37 a6 Bxe4 38 Re1 Ba8 39 Ne4 Nf4 40 a7 f6 41 h4 c3! 42 Nc5 c2 0–1