In the second round of the A-Open of the 50th International Dortmund Chess Days the top seeded players show strong form: Matthias Blübaum, Alexander Donchenko and Michael Adams won the second round with ease. In the Sportland NRW Cup, shooting star Hussain Besou fought his way to a draw from a bad position against "The Big Greek".
Alexander Donchenko managed a nice combination very early on: 15.Sxf7!! secured Donchenko (photo) a big advantage, which he carried to victory. In the interview he told about his deep preparation: Interview and analysis
Matthias Blübaum castled long in the Caro-Kann and was able to build up an attack on the kingside, which led him to victory against Ashot Parvanyan. Ruslan Ponomarev, on the other hand, is the second world-class player after Gata Kamsky yesterday who had to give up half a point. Overall, there are still a few players without a point loss, but there will be three top games on stage on Monday.
WGM Dinara Wagner leads the Sportland NRW Cup
The highlight on the second day of the tournament was the first appearance of Hussain Besou, who will turn 12 in August, on stage in the Goldsaal of the Westfalenhallen Dortmund. He met "The Big Greek" Georgios Souleidis (cover photo) with black. Souleidis gained a big advantage and was on his way to his second point. But he did not close the game, Besou defended stubbornly and was able to hold the game in a draw after 4.5 hours.
WGM Dinara Wagner played next to him, just like yesterday. After her dream start on Saturday, she had Alexander Bagrationi, the second grandmaster, in front of her. In the endgame she had some pressure for a long time, even though Bagrationi should objectively hold a draw. But with time running out, he misplayed and in the end went over time in a losing position. This makes her the only one with 2 points from 2 games and she leads the tournament alone!
The other two winners of the first day, Vadym Petrovskiy and Ruben Gideon Köllner, drew after an even game. On Monday, both competitions will continue at 3 pm, when the NC World Masters 2023 will also start!