Rapid chess is so unpredictable! We are trying to catch some interesting moments for you and will upload the diagrams during whole day.

Round 1

Dronavalli v Sukhareva 1-0

A perfect position for White and the Black pieces are still stuck on the starting rank.
23. e6 and the game ends.

A. Muzychuk v Ubiennykh 1-0

Sacrificing the Rook on e6 leading to a nice attack on the Black’s King
16. Rxe6 

Muminova v Ushenina 0-1         

3 queens on the board and the players are 2 queens of the chess world.
95. Qb6 g1=Q.

Zhao v Bezgodova 1-0

A nice position and beginning with an attack on the Black’s king.
28. Ncb6+ axb6

Round 2

Paehtz v Dronavalli 1-0

34. Rxh5 is the start of a winning attack for white.

Tuvshintugs v Guseva ½ 

Black missed a good opportunity to win this end game by 80…Rxf7 81. Rxf7 Bd5 82.Kd5 Kxf7 -/+

Ushenina v Krush 1-0

Black’s pawn on c3 is going to promote soon but after 36. Be5! White’s attack is too strong. 

Round 3

A. Muzychuk v Lagno 0-1

24. h5 was a blunder from Muzychuk and white should have played 24. Bd2 and its quite ok for her. After 24… Nf3 Black has a decisive attack.

Fominykh v Khotenashvili 1-0

With the help of Black’s 46th move of Rg5, this helped white seal the game with 47. Rc2+ Kd7 48. Rxc7+ Kxc7 49. Ne6+ and white will have a winning endgame.

Gunina v Popova 1-0

Black’s 29th move of Rxf2 only makes Gunina happy as the game continues as follows: 30. Rxe6 Rxe6 31. Rxe6 Qf8 32. Rf6+ Kh8 33. Rxf8+ Rxf8 34. Nxd7 +/-.

Krush v Bezgodova 1-0

17. Nd5 was the start of what would be the attack that “crushes” Bezgodova.

Round 4

Ubiennykh v Gunina

Gunina the top seed has another loss after giving her position away with 25……e5. The next couple of moves of the game were 26. Nxb7 Qd7 27. Nxd6 Qxd6 28. Rcxc6 Qd8…

Lagno v Kosteniuk 1-0

Lagno was happy with the Black’s 30th move of Rxd4 as this becomes the time when the Ukrainian GM takes advantage of the former Women’s World Champion.

Goryachkina v Muminova 0-1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A brilliant exchange sacrifice on move 33 for Black after Muminova takes the Bishop on d2 with the Rook. The game continues like this: 34. Nxd2 Qh7+ 35. Kg1 Ng4+ 36. Kf1 Ne3+

Round 5

There will only be one game for this round and this is the game between Tatiana Kosintseva v Kateryna Lagno. We will take a look at the important moments of the game.

This was one of the key moments of the game. Kosintseva has just played 24. Nf6+ and Black should play Kh8 but instead plays Bxf6. This is not so good and we will see why soon.

Black’s 25th move was terrible and with the nice combination of 26. Bxe6 gxf6 27. Rxg6

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This position now is totally lost for black and after Black’s 27th move of Kxg6 White responds immediately with Rg1+ and Lagno resigns. Black’s small mistake with taking on f6 on move 24 lead to the brilliant combination from Kosintseva. Kosintseva is now in the lead with 4.5/5 after the 1st day’s play.

 

Games selected by Jamie Kenmure.