This tournament’s yearly photo opportunity took place – predictably – on the Chao Phraya river, courtesy of the Royal Orchid Sheraton Riverside Hotel management who put their luxurious ferry boat at the disposal of the organisers.
Under a bright morning sun, the whole family of Indian GM Surya Ganguly posed for the photographers as the boat departed to the massive Icon Siam commercial center situated across the hotel.
Three games were then played underway to the Thaksin bridge and back, with defending champion GM Vitaliy Bernadskyi facing WFM Aleksandra Samaganova before leaving the board to GMs Evgeny Romanov and Nigel Short.
In the remaining game, GM Jan Gustafsson managed to reach a promising position against Nina Tuorila, the tournament director’s daughter. He did however chicken out and offered a draw, keeping with the tradition that every game played during BCC photo ops must end with a peaceful result.
In a first this year around, the top three boards had six GMs battling it out today. Battling being the operative word: no grandmasterly draws here, Sir!
On board 1 Evgeny Romanov uncorked a deep and powerful combination to bring down Surya Ganguly following a balanced middle game contest in which the Indian GM declined a draw offer by move 25.
1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5 4.c3 Nc6 5.Nf3 Bd7 6.Be2 Nge7 7.O-O Nf5 8.dxc5 a5 9.Bd3 Bxc5 10.a4 h6 11.Nbd2 Bb6 12.Nb3 Nh4 13.Nxh4 Qxh4 14.Qe2 O-O 15.Be3 Qd8 16.Bc2 Bxe3 17.Qxe3 f6 18.exf6 Rxf6 19.Nc5 b6 20.Nxd7 Qxd7 21.Rae1 Qd6 22.Qd3 g6 23.Re3 Qc5 24.Rh3 Kg7 25.Qd2 Rh8 26.Rb1 Ne5 27.b4 Qc7 28.bxa5 bxa5 29.Rb5 The start of the decisive manoeuvre, allowing the doubling of the Rooks on the f-file. 29..h5 30.Rg3 Rhf8 31.Qd4 Rxf2 32.Rxg6+
32..Kh7 The crux. Seldom does one see a King go willingly into a vortex of discovered checks, and emerge triumphant. 33.Rg3+ Rxc2 34.Qd1 Kh6 35.h3 Qa7+ 36.Kh2 Qf2 37.h4 Rf4 38.Kh3 Rg4 0-1
At board 2, Stephen Gordon was hanging on in spite of undergoing some time and positional pressure at the hands of Nigel Short. Things then took a turn for the worse for him after the capture of a forbidden pawn on c2, after which it appeared White’s two minor pieces would have dominated Black’s Rook. Instead Black invaded White’s first rank, won White’s Bishop and converted the win after liquidating into a won pawn endgame.
On board 3, Babu Lalit overcame the resistance of Jozsef Horvath with a timely Queenside breakthrough culminating with a triple battery of White’s heavy pieces on the a-file.
They are joined in 2-4 places by junior FM Ern Ang from Malaysia, who managed to defeat IM Hafiz.
The six leaders in the Open section were pitted against each other on the top three boards. First to finish were Paulo Bersamina and Babu Lalit on board 3, following a short and balanced affair.
On board 1, Evgeny Romanov kept grinding like a grandmaster against James Morris’ well-organised defences, and could have paid a heavy price for his optimistic play. In the end however, White’s passed pawn prevailed.
Arif Hafiz and Surya Ganguly appeared to have all the fun to themselves in one of the most mind-boggling games of the tournament so far. The Indonesian IM entered the tournament hall late like Fischer, went on to play an early Ke2 like Steinitz and proceeded to get in time trouble like Reshevsky. What followed was the kind of swashbuckling slugfest only an engine can comprehend:
Hafiz, Arif Abdul (2343) – Ganguly, Surya Shekhar (2572)
Cast in the pursuers’ role within a large chasing pack of players on 4/5, top seeds Gustafsson and Short both produced dominant displays albeit with varying levels of fortune.
As the former did not manage to make his pawn advantage count in a Rook endgame, the latter capped his positional advantage with a winning sacrifice.
Mid-tournament syndrome is that moment in the week when games get evenly matched, and hence the action doesn’t decant quite as quickly. For the correspondent, it’s usually that time when one realises he actually needs that other cup of coffee or that extra kick of insulin. When things are quiet in the press room, and one would wish Yasser Seirawan were there to delight the audience with some witty anecdote from the defunct century.
Round 4 had left us with a trio of leaders, two of whom were squaring off on the top board. The game between GM Babu Lalit from India and Indonesian IM Ariz Abdul Hafiz, was a finely balanced affair although Black’s Queen had ventured off to snatch a pawn as early as move 4.
On board two, Macedonian GM Romanov made short work of the third co-leader, FM Arca from the Philippines after the white Queen went on an unsuccessful fishing expedition on the Kingside.
Meanwhile, Thai star Prin Laohawirapap was facing a resurgent Nigel Short. After dominating the opening phase with the Black pieces, Prin got low on time and struggled to maintain his advantage before going astray wih 24… h5, when the position became level but with the momentum firmly on White’s side. There were a couple more plot twists, with White going astray shortly after entering a 4-Rook endgame. Black however failed to capitalise, capturing the wrong pawn (35…. Rxd4 instead of … Rxb2) after which the soon to be sexagenarian grandmaster had no difficulty steering the position towards a peaceful conclusion.
As several players on 3.5 points came out victorious, we enter tonight’s blitz final stage – as well as round 6 – with an unexpectedly large squad of competitors leading with 4.5/5.
Today’s round was preceded by a colourful display of some thirty Thai children in traditional costumes in the playing hall. Not as late entries to the BCC Open mind you, but to take part in a junior Makruk (Thai chess) tournament organised by the eponymous association.
For those BCC participants who are eager to discover this interesting chess variant, the Thailand Makruk Association will organise two separate tournaments on April 19 and 20 starting at 9:00am. These events will consist of 6 rounds with a tempo of 15 minutes with 5 second increments and will take place in the BCC Open analysis room, also known in the Sheraton vernacular as the Pompadour room.
One would have been forgiven for thinking that many of the day’s games would be expedited in anticipation of tonight’s blitz qualifiers which will see a capacity crowd of 112 battle it out for the privilege of a spot in tomorrow’s final.
But the opposite happened, and this round was not a walk in the park for any of the leaders by any stretch of the imagination. Board 1 ended in a draw between GM Romanov and IM Bersamina.
BCC champions Bernadskiy and Ganguly pressed hard against Hafiz Arif and Michael Concio respectively. The reigning champion could not take advantage of his opponent’s time pressure woes and ended in a lost pawn endgame. The 2016 and 2020 winner was more fortunate, scoring a hard-fought draw.
On board 4, Lalit Babu produced a positional gem against Alexander Chernyavsky. But yet another upset came on the fifth table, at the hands of FIDE Master Arca:
OK, so here’s one for the conspiracy theorists: Black keeps the Knight because it is the key piece in the ensuing endgame. 10. Nf3 And here’s one for the others: White could refute it by playing 10. Qb3 here instead. 10… Bg6 11. Qb3 Ra7 12. Ne5 Nd7 13. Nxg6 hxg6 14. e4 dxc4 15. Bxc4 b5 16. Be2 c5 17. d5 c4 18. Qc2 Bc5 19. Bf4 e5 Black concedes a passed pawn but crucially starts to win the battle for the dark squares. 20. Bg3 g5 21. a4 Rb7 22. axb5 axb5 23. b3 Castling was a lesser evil. 25… Bd4 24. Rc1 Nc5 25. bxc4 b4 26. Nb5 b3 27. Qb1 Nf6 28. f3 O-O 29. Nxd4?! (Kf1 and White retains a fighting chance). Qa5+ 30. Kf1 exd4 31. Bf2 31… b2 32. Rd1 Na4 33. Bxd4 Nc3 34. Bxc3 Qxc3 35. Qd3 Qe5 36. Rb1 Rfb8 37. Bd1 Nd7 38. Qe3 Rb4 39. h4 Nb6 40. c5 Nxd5 0-1
Round 3 of the Bangkok Chess Club Open witnessed several closely contested battles as the Elo gap between opponents continued to shrink. Of particular interest to local observers was the encounter on board 5 between Indian GM Lalit and the young Thai candidate master Jonathan Bodemar. Agreed, it is a rather odd name around these parts, so please bear with us for a moment.
Born in 2006 of a Swedish father and a Thai mother, Jonathan already has the recent Budapest Olympiad under his belt and will also take part in the Sea Games at the end of this year.
Unlike many young chess talents in this day and age, he has multiple interests including swimming and basketball. The busy school curriculum in Thailand as well as his Swedish lessons have so far left him with relatively few opportunities to delve in chess, but this could change as he plans to enlist in a university in Sweden next year.
Although his game today went in favour of his grandmaster opponent, Jonathan will likely continue to challenge his compatriot IM Prin Laohawirapap for the tournament’s first prize rewarding a representative of the Thailand Chess Association.
On a neighbouring board, former World Championship contender GM Short bounced right back from his disappointing game of yesterday with a spectacular sacrificial attack. Playing against Andersen must have conjured up shades of another, much more ancient Anderssen, straight out of a romantic game of the mid-19th century…
1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 d6 3. f4 The Grand Prix attack, a favourite of the British chess circuit back when Nigel Short was a young man. 3… g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Bb5+ Bd7 6. Bc4 Nc6 7. O-O e6 8. Kh1 Nf6 9. d3 O-O 10. a3 a6 11. Ba2 b5 12. e5 dxe5 13. fxe5 Ng4 14. Bg5 Qc7 15. Ne4 Ncxe5 16. Bf4 Qb6?! Right piece, wrong square. Moving the Queen to c6 instead would grant Black a good position. 17. Nxe5 Nxe5 18. Be3 Rfc8 19. b4 Bc6 20. Nxc5 Qd8 21. Qe2 Nd7? Allows White to ignite some serious Songkran fireworks; … a5 was indicated.
The sensation of the round came from board number one, with top seed Jan Gustafsson committing hara kiri in a balanced position, all while his nearby rivals had a relatively quiet day at the office.
Games: https://www.chess.com/events/2025-bangkok-open/games Open section: https://chess-results.com/tnr1137279.aspx?lan=1 Challenger section: https://chess-results.com/tnr1137307.aspx?lan=1
