Learning from Levon Aronian
I start this article by echoing the words of Garry Kasparov:
After Aronian won the Sinquefield Cup in September 2015, Kasparov congratulated Aronian and tweeted that the chess world is a better place when Aronian is playing well! How true!
Levon Aronian won the Norway Chess Open – strongest tournament of the year! In this article, I share a few personal observations about his games and highlight a few factors and positions that got him the title.
Before the classical chess, the players played a blitz event consisting of 9 rounds. Magnus Carlsen dominated the field and won the event with 7.5/9. The other players were at least two points behind. Aronian tied for second but bagged third with 5.5/9.
I liked his win against So Wesley where he executed a mini improvement:
Here, Aronian chose to retreat his rook to c1:
- Learning: It is useful to prepare improvements as they may come handy in the future.
In this game, Aronian prevents the ideas of Nakamura and also builds a strong position by improving his pieces:
Black to move
16…Qb6!
This offer ensures that the minority attack is prevented for sometime.
Aronian uses his time to improve the position of his Queen:
Now, it is time for the knight to go to a better square!
…Nf6!
…h5!
In most of the elite clashes, I have observed that they usually involve in one of the following tasks when there are no forced variations to calculate:
a)Prevent opponent’s ideas (Prophylaxis)
b) Improve the position of their pieces
c) Favorable Exchanges
d) Prepare a luft for the king (g3, h3 / g6, h6)
After an interesting draw against Giri, Aronian faced Magnus Carlsen in the 4th game with white pieces and they reached the following position:
10. Qc2, 10.Qe1, 10.Ne5, 10.Re1, 10.Ne2 & 10.c5 are the popular moves in the position. Aronian employed an original idea by playing 10.Bc2!?
In the ChessBase India’s report on Round 4, Sagar Shah explains the idea:
The move Bc2 was the novelty essayed by Levon Aronian in the game. The idea is quite deep. Aronian would like to play a3 on the next move when after Bxa3 Rxa3 Qxa3 he would like to close the position with c5. However, if the bishop were on d3, then after a3 Bxa3 Rxa3 Black has the intermediate dxc4! and the plan doesn’t work! Hence Bc2!? – See more at http://chessbase.in/news/norway-chess-2017-r4/
According to the broadcast on playchess.com, Carlsen spent 24 minutes in this position and played 10…Rd8.
White to move
White to move
White to move
In this position, Aronian chose 30.h3! (Refer to point 2 – Providing luft for the king)
Learning: This game shows us that having an original idea in a variation gives a big boost and increases your chances for a victory!
In the fifth game, Aronian employed the Marshall Gambit against Vachier-Lagrave! Interestingly, he had played the same variation in the blitz game as well. The game fizzled out into a draw as white didn’t pose much trouble.
In the sixth classical game, Aronian played the same variation that he had chosen in the blitz game. But, he deviated on the 11th move:
11.Bc4
6…a5 is an Aronian specialty and he (you guessed it right) repeated his blitz game but deviated slightly before his opponent could execute the improvement:
10…Kh8!?
Here, white is intending to play Qd4:
Aronian prevents it by …f3, followed by Rf4!
Aronian shows remarkable feeling for the initiative based on the fact that white’s pieces are scattered and the white king feels a little lonely
Aronian takes his blitz games seriously and uses them as experiments for the classical event. A few years back, a GM told me that he plays six blitz games, thrice a week. Three with white and three games with black. He logs off from the interface after the six games irrespective of the result. By the end of the day, he analyses his games and improves on those games! This is a great idea to save yourself from falling into opening traps.
Learning: Using blitz games as part of your preparation could help you in the main tournaments.
In the final game, Aronian played with an isolated queen pawn. After the queens got exchanged, he conducted the game with utmost precision – always keeping his pieces active and sought counter play with ease.
Staying alert and active is a master trait!
If you check the games, it is easy to understand that Aronian was always in a good shape, alert throughout the games and executed strong ideas whenever there was an opportunity. There was a balance in his play and that is a pleasure to witness! Let’s hope that we get to see more of such acts from Levon Aronian!
Featured Image: Amrutaz Photography
