Rounds 3-4: Luis Engel Sole Leader

The second day of the tournament began at ten o'clock in the morning with rain and wind again outside, making it perfect chess weather indoors. A full fourteen players were still at one hundred percent, and by the end of the day, only one remained. GM Luis Engel is on 4/4 and will have to prove himself tomorrow against his first opponent of the same strength: GM Alexander Bagrationi, who has 3.5 points.

Due to the Swiss format, we saw few games between title holders and few unusual results in the third round. On board two, Rafael Goudriaan (2200) held a respectable draw against IM Ataberk Eren (2417), and two other masters also failed to win. IM Anwesh Upadhyaya (2411) drew against William Gijsen (2142), who had started with two byes. IM Barry Brink, who had surprisingly lost the previous round to Arthur Maters (2146), only managed a half-point against Ardin Bosboom (2142).

Another surprise occurred on a board belonging to one of our streamers. FM Anna-Maja Kazarian (2244) didn't have a good start to her tournament. She lost on Friday afternoon, and subsequently in round three, to Joel van der Werf (2139), who countered her Najdorf with the remarkable maneuver 6.Bg5 Nbd7 7.Be3!?. Apparently, this has been played by several grandmasters for a few years now, but it was new to this author.

In any case, in a tense middlegame, the position opened up a bit more, and the critical position came on move 24.

Van der Werf-Kazarian

ACO (3), 2025

Here, Black should try 24...Qc6 25.Qxc6+ bxc6 26.Rd2 Bc4 with chances for a draw. Kazarian's 24...Qb6 was too passive and after 25.Re1 Bc4 26.Rxe5+ Be7 27.Qe4 Rxe5 28.Qxe5 f6 29.Qd4 White's attack was too strong. In round four, Kazarian managed to bounce back with a win.

Kazarian looking at 7.Be3!?.

FM Murad Abdulla (2310) initially didn't achieve much in the opening against Ralf Sterk (2049), who, however, at one point allowed himself to be tempted into winning an exchange. Immediately afterward, it became clear that his position was already quite hopeless.

Abdulla-Sterk

ACO (3), 2025

White has just moved his pawn to b3 and Black couldn't resist: 19...Nf3? (19...Nd7 20.Rb1 Nf6 is quite safe, although Black is worse off because of his knight on a5.) 20.Qxf3 Bxa1 21.Ng4 (This is already hardly defensible.) 21...Bg7 22.fxg6

22...f5 (If Black recaptures on g6 with one of the pawns, 23.Nh6+ also follows.) 23.Nh6+ Bxh6 24.gxh7+ Kf7 25.Qh5+ 1–0

Abdulla-Sterk on the bottom board in the photo.

You could say the tournament truly began in round four on Saturday afternoon, when we finally saw many title holders playing each other. As mentioned, amidst all this clash of arms, it was Luis Engel (2560) who was the only one left with a perfect score. The Hamburg grandmaster defeated Rick Lahaye (2378), the winner of the first ACO tournament, on the first board.

Engel-Lahaye

ACO (4), 2025

After a risky opening, Lahaye had been under pressure for a while. Two things are noteworthy in this position: the rook on a5 is Black's king's rook (ha!), and here he should have tried the pawn sacrifice 22...Kf8! 23.cxd5 Nd6. Instead, 22...e6? 23.cxd5 exd5 24.Bf2! followed.

A cold shower. White simply picks up h4 with a winning position. 24...Qb8 25.Qb4 b6 26.Bxh4 Bf8 27.Qc3 Be7 28.Bxe4 Nxe4 And now the petite combinaison:

29.Rxe4! dxe4 30.Nc6 Qxf4 31.Bxe7 Bxc6 32.Bf6 1–0

Luis Engel: no mistakes yet.

A draw was played on boards two through four. Only five players are now on 3.5 points, half a point behind Engel: GM Alexander Bagrationi, IM Tim Grutter (last year's winner), FM Yasin Sari, FM Murad Abdulla, and FM Petr Walek, who held Bagrationi to a draw.

An oddity in this tournament is the third grandmaster in the field. GM Antonios Pavlidis, who shares his last name with a famous footballer, had a bye for the first two rounds, then won twice on Saturday, only to skip another round on Sunday morning. The author is still trying to figure out the reason behind this remarkable pattern.

In both B groups, there's one player left with a 4/4 rating: Arthur Vlug (2018) in B1 and Belgian Yari Coucke (2073) in B2. The same applies to group C1, where German Bjarne Kneesch (1790) has won everything. In C2, there are two, both with a 1821 rating: Alboreno Vuka (1821) from Greece and WFM Thai Ngoc Tuong Minh from Vietnam. They will, of course, play each other tomorrow.

Group D1 has no fewer than three leaders with a 4/4 rating: Maksim Bulva (1657) from Poland, Benjamin Carter (1605) from England, and Dutchman Agus Sutrisno (still unrated). In group D2, Orhan Galip Ozdemir (1685) and Chris van Gasteren (unrated), both with a 4/4 rating, will battle it out tomorrow.