It is not surprising that the first 6 places of the April top ten are occupied by the games from the Russian team championship. The cream of world chess gathered in Dagomys and being inspired with team spirit littered the masterpieces. When Vladimir Barsky, Sergei Ivanov and Sergei Klimov complain that it is so difficult make a decision, they just express the common attitude of the jury. Beside them Ekaterina Kovalevskaja, Emil Sutovsky and Michal Krasenkow, Evgeny Gleizerov, Alexei Lugovoi, Sergei Soloviov and Ilia Odesskij took part in voting. The latter in this outstanding list asked a reasonable question – why the game of the 5^th contrary to usual did not become one of the nominees. I mean, Ilia Odesskij was impressed by the encounter Eljanov – Sutovsky that was not included in the top twenty. The point is that a presence effect can sometimes play a negative role: I observed the analysis of the ending of this brilliant game and saw that happy winner over and over again could not prove the correctness of piece sacrifice for a remote passed pawn (this one can consider to be his speciality after the encounter with Kotsur). The other day Emil said to me that at home he rehabilitated the plan, in which Black did not lose in the lines, but it was already late to change anything. It is clear that there are some other games that were also ignored by the columnist with a heavy heart. We have already talked about it in January, so let us not repeat.

Otherwise we can arrive at an idea to challenge the system of voting, and then we will be definitely lost in procedural questions. Especially because this time there is a temptation to do it. The game Moiseenko – Svidler that received 2 first places (Ivanov, Soloviov), 3 second ones, a pair of 4^th places and was put in the top ten by all the experts became the winner according to the score (173). And the sensation of the month, the encounter Chernyshov – Grischuk, though rated only with 165 points, won 4 (!) first places (Lugovoi, Barsky, Kovalevskaya, Sutovsky) and 1 second, and in half of the lists the immortal communist game of Zugzwang took more modest positions. According to the regulations I proclaim Peter to be a laureate, and if he wants, Kostantin can arrange a rematch in Voronezh, as it already happened to them once.

Segei Ivanov says following about the winning game: “This encounter is the most typical modern Gruenfeld: the sharpest opening variation, strong novelty from Black, lively pieces’ play with mutual thrusts and counterblows. I really liked this game because it reminded me the favorite variation of Botvinnik: Black offered twice a rook sacrifice, receiving an armada of passers on the queen’s side in exchange for it. This is a great interpenetration of openings!”

Let Evgeny Gleizerov utter about the encounter Chernyshov – Grischuk: “It does not matter for Konstantin Chernyshov, who he plays with, – he just plays his own chess, not always correct, but always interesting. This time he managed almost to запатовать Grischuk having sacrificed 2 pawns. Right up to the 19^th move (!) Black preserved all the pieces and even pawns, however, surprisingly he had no piece to move and he had to putthe knight en prise only to breathe freely. It is rather a unique.”

A small announcement: both outstanding games will be annotated by the players in the 6^th issue of the “64 Chess Review”.

After a commercial break let us continue summing up. On the 3^rd place we see “a brilliant technical achievement of Pavel Smirnov” (Gleizerov). “We are used to expect tactical masterpieces from him, but he turns out to play perfectly in this manner as well. The main embellishment of the game is an incredible journey of the white king along the route c2-d3-e2-f2-g3-h4-g5-f6-f7-e8-c6-b5. Someone hardly could assume around the 40^th move that the king’s attack on the c6-pawn in the rear would decide the game!” Sergei Klimov and Sergei Soloviov echo the dean of the judicial guild. The former says: “How did he manage to breach such a man! In an absolutely drawn variation. Like Capablanca he made it with the small combination and other amenities.” And the latter names the games of Smirnov and Aronian “(yet) unachievable patterns”. We will return some lines below to Aronian, but now allow me to switch our conversation about the encounter Smirnov – Sakaev to bookkeeping level: 3 first places (Gleizerov, Krasenkow, and Klimov) and 3 second positions, 151 points. I hope that this positional masterpiece will be properly explained by one of our experts.

You can acquaint with annotations to the encounter that took the 4^th place in our voting in the second part of the Dagomys survey of Vladimir Barskij. Having played in a style that is not characteristic for him, Alexander Galkin mated Yemelin and deserved his portion of applause: 1 second, 4 third and 2 forth places, 137 points.

A powerful pressure of Vadim Zvjiagincev on of Evgeny Bareev’s position is a bit behind. 132 points, 3 second places. Sergei Shipov annotated this game on ChessPro, though only by dabs.

It is written in the “Chess Week” magazine about the victory of Levon Aronian over Sergei Volkov that it “looks like positional masterpieces of Capablanca that are more interesting just to enjoy than to make a detailed analysis”. Shipov seems to share these views, but I have some doubts – perhaps we have to charge someone with a survey: what if the variation with 4…а6 in the Slavic already closed? Odesskij put this game on the 1^st place, and the score is 110 points.

The trainer of Olympic champions Vladimir Tukmakov has 5 points less for his victory over Joseph Gallagher that was gained far from Dagomys, in the Open tournament in Switzerland. One expresses certain, but not too exuberant admiration about another example of positional play Gelfand –Malakhov (97 points – you will also find this encounter soon on the pages of the “64 Chess Review”). Further the level of interest falls down. I can give only a few names and figures: Kempinski – Almashy (79), Hillarp Persson – S.B.Hansen (67), Svidler – Van Wely (66), Rublevsky – Dreev (65), Nakamura – Smirin (62), Milman – Fang (59) etc.

At the end of the month there will be a detailed analysis of the best games of this list, meanwhile the struggles in Sofia are loaded in the next base...