Yesterday elo-favourite Marsel Efroimski lost an unfortunate game. Today she bounced back with a win over Josefine Heinemann to take back the lead. With plenty of tense games in time trouble this was a round with a lot of drama.
Josefine Heinemann has played a very convincing tournament so far. Today she met her nemesis in a very well prepared Marsel Efroimski. In a French Tarrasch the players were following two previous games of the Israeli IM for quite some time – unfortunately these games had escaped the attention of the German player in her preparation. The plan with 13…a5, 14…a4 and 15…Ra5 deserves serious attention. Heinemann’s 16.Bf4 was actually an improvement over 16.Rb1?! as in Efroimski(!)-Kashlinskaya, Warsaw rapid 2021. Black obtained comfortable play, but no more if White had played 22.Qg3. Instead 22.Qf3? allowed 22…Rg5! (clearly showing the attraction of 15…Ra5) and 23…e5! with a winning advantage. Try as she might the German player could not avoid her first loss.
Petra Papp scored her first win at the cost of Marta Garcia Martin. In a topical Queen’s Gambit with 4…a6 White obtained an edge when Black did not find the right response to 13.Nd2 (planning f4-f5). The risky-looking 13…g5 would have been correct whilst the game continuation 13…Be7?! 14.f4 gave White a dangerous attack. Marta did what she could (the intermediate 19…g6! was well-spotted), but failed to trade queens when she could. In mutual time trouble Black was briefly fine again, but this was only one a fleeting moment whilst being continuously under pressure. The final blunder on move 40 did not affect the result.
Anastasia Avramidou continued her strong performance here with a win over Trisha Kanyamarala. In a slightly obscure Rauzer 8…a6 was inaccurate, as was 9…Bxc6 instead of 9…bxc6. Eventually a typical endgame arose where in view of Black’s multiple pawn islands things were practically difficult for Trisha. The double rook ending was not lost if Black had played …f5-f4 at some point for active counter chances (31…f4! was best but playing this on move 32 or 33 was still fine too). After 35.f4! all options for counterplay were gone, and White won convincingly.
The game between Robin Duson and Machteld van Foreest ended in a draw but all other results were possible too! In a topical Queen’s Gambit Exchange Variation both players came fairly well-prepared. There are still quite a few games in the database after 16…Bc8. Robin’s 17.b4 had to be answered by 17…Nc4! (Navara-Adams, Biel 2015) rather than by the passive 17…Na8. After 19.Qa4 things were fine for Black again after the excellent 19…b6!. Then there were a few hiccups on both sides. 25…a6? turned a good position into an equal one. On move 32 it made sense to capture on a3. Both before and after the time control on move 40 Robin missed a couple of good chances. 44.Nh6+ was strong, as was the surprising 47.e4!. With only heavy pieces on the board a draw was the final correct result.
Real drama in Alicja Sliwicka versus Laura Unuk. An exciting Ruy Lopez with 3…Nge7 became a highly creative fight on both sides (5.h4 followed by h5 and h6; 13…Qf6). Laura slowly started to take over. With three extra pawns(!) and opposite-coloured bishops things were strangely enough never easy. White could have suddenly equalized with 33.Kxg2 instead of 33.Rxg2. When the dust had settled after move 40 Laura was still 3 pawns ahead, but with no easy win in sight. She played well until 57…Kb4? when after 58.Kd6 Alicja was no longer lost. Laura was unlucky that only 60…c3! would have saved the draw. Instead 60…Rg2 allowed a kind of mating attack. She had to give up material but could not avoid the loss.
