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There was no stopping Russia in Reykjavik! For the first time since 2007 they claimed double gold in a major team event. The men finished with a solid four draws against Hungary, giving Judit Polgar’s team bronze. Silver was snatched by team phenomenon Armenia with a 3:1 victory over Georgia, while France just missed out. The Russian women eased to victory by beating Germany, with Ukraine taking silver and Georgia bronze. What did we learn from the 2015 European Team Championship?
Team Captain Mark Glukhovsky raises the golden trophy for the Russian men's team | photo: Russian Chess Federation Twitter
Russia provided the only teams to remain unbeaten in Reykjavik, and their victories in both sections were utterly deserved. The Russia women are of course used to success and claimed their fourth European Team Championship in five attempts. Although they suffered the indignity of going into the event not actually seeded no. 1 – Georgia were a fraction ahead of them – they played like top seeds from start to finish, only conceding a draw to reigning champions and eventual silver medallists Ukraine. 17-year-old Aleksandra Goryachkina’s brilliant 7/8 bodes well for the future.
Time for a group photo! | photo: Tarjei J. Svensen, Twitter
The men, meanwhile, can’t boast quite such a good historical record in team events… They last won the European Teams in 2007, which while not as much of an anomaly as last winning the Olympiad in 2002 is still a clear case of underperforming.
This time round, though, there were no mistakes. Three wins against weaker opposition and a crucial 3:1 victory over second seeds Ukraine gave Russia the sole lead after Round 4. They never relinquished it, always doing just enough with 2.5:1.5 wins over Georgia and France and 2:2 draws with Azerbaijan, Armenia and finally Hungary.
Afterwards team leader Peter Svidler, who was rock solid on top board, commented, “It’s a bit of relief to finally stumble over the finish line… we finally won something!” Evgeny Tomashevsky, who copied Svidler not only in scoring an unbeaten +2 but also in playing the first 15 moves of deep Marshall Gambit theory in the final round, had an accurate assessment of the event:
All members of our team at some moments played our best chess. That’s why we won. All of our players contributed something nice.
Both pointed to Ian Nepomniachtchi’s crucial win on demand in the penultimate round, saving a match draw after Alexander Grischuk got into trouble. Svidler described his feelings:
Just happy and relieved. It’s been a while and it’s a good feeling to finally play well for the national team.
He also gave Simon Williams the answer the English grandmaster was hoping for to a question about how the team would celebrate:
There will probably be some imbibing of liquids at some point.
It’s not clear if that had already happened or not, but the selfie Alexander Grischuk took is one for the ages!
"Smile!" | photo: Tarjei J. Svensen, Twitter
Sergey Shipov once commented on Gabriel Sargissian:
At the Olympiads he plays at a level 100 points above what he’s capable of
Three wins (including the scalps of Howell and Grischuk) and five draws gave Sargissian a 2808 rating performance that propelled him into the 2700 club by the time the event was over.
If that was expected by now, few could have predicted 2632-rated Hrant Melkumyan’s four wins (including vs. Short and Fridman) and five draws for a 2770 performance. Like Levon Aronian, Melkumyan played all nine games, showing no sign of weakness:
Sergei Movsesian lost three games, but his wins were crucial
to the team’s success. Aronian himself, of course, had a role to play. Beating
the World Champion Magnus Carlsen was sandwiched between two losses to Adams
and Vachier-Lagrave, but after that turbulent start Levon was in commanding
form.
Of course when almost your whole team overperforms good things happen – like claiming silver medals on tiebreaks!
Hungary, meanwhile, seem to be following in the footsteps of Armenia. The 7th seeds took bronze medals to add to their silver medals at the 2014 Olympiad, with all team members except Peter Leko performing above their rating. It wasn’t a bad start to Judit Polgar’s coaching career after she stepped down from her previous role as the women’s no. 1:
Richard Rapport’s loss to Pavel Eljanov cost Hungary their only match defeat in Reykjavik, but it would be hard to hold it against him. The 19-year-old had become the forgotten prodigy - despite starting the year at 2716 he fell out of the Top 100 by sinking to 2649 on the September rating list. Now after five wins and a 2828 performance in the Euro Teams he’s back up where he belongs, with a 2715.2 rating putting him at world no. 33. The only player younger and higher-rated is a certain Wei Yi.
4th seeded France finished 4th – when you put it like that it doesn’t seem as though the order of the universe has been upset. France, though, were the one team to finish on 13 points and miss out on medals, despite having drawn with Hungary and beaten Armenia. That latter result came the day after the terrible events in Paris, with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave managing to put them out of his mind long enough to beat Aronian – ultimately he shared the Armenian’s 2835 rating performance (it should be noted that Viktor Bologan - 2845 and Levan Pantsulaia – 2868, did even better).
A brilliant win for Vlad Tkachiev over Sergei Tiviakov (here's the final position)…
…and some last ditch defence by Laurent Fressinet, gave France victory over the Netherlands in the final round, but it wasn’t to be. The French team captain tweeted:
Huge disappointment after that fine win over the Netherlands. On the podium during the whole tournament, we end 4th #ETCC2015 #depressing
Well done to the players, who never let go despite the difficult circumstances… This team has given its all. Target: Baku 2016
It’s not that Magnus has never done as well in team events as he does in individual competitions, but you do have to go back a while! At the 2006 Turin Olympiad he was rated 2646 but performed at 2820, while at the 2007 European Team Championship in Crete he was rated 2714 but performed at 2757, despite a final round loss. Since then it’s been mainly downhill, and it’s become expected that Carlsen will suffer some difficult moments when he represents Norway – a team that can’t really match his ambitions, even if 16-year-old Aryan Tari will soon be a grandmaster and Jon Ludvig Hammer is knocking on the door of the 2700 club.
Magnus Carlsen couldn't prevent Norway losing to Germany or to Poland in the final round for a disappointing 21st place for the 11th seeds | photo: Hrafn Jökulsson, official website
Carlsen started in Round 3 and while a loss to Aronian is the kind of thing that can happen, the loss to Pelletier and draws against weaker players must have been frustrating. Fortunately, though, the last round pairing was just what Magnus needed. Radek Wojtaszek was the one top player to have lost even more rating points (three losses, three draws), and had also lost with the black pieces to Magnus in the 2014 Olympiad. He may have been regretting his pre-tournament motivational tweet (but nice video!):
Wojtaszek bravely castled queenside to turn an innocuous opening into a sharp fight, but it was Magnus who came out on top with a beautiful final position:
That left Wojtaszek down 24.8 rating points, but Carlsen couldn’t really be happy with his minus 16 either – the headline stat that he’s rated at his lowest point since 2011 will become official on the December FIDE rating list. Or, to put it another way, be afraid, London Chess Classic participants!
The best evidence for this is perhaps Carlsen dropping a piece against Pelletier, but he wasn’t the only star to suffer misfortune in Reykjavik. Alexei Shirov was in some difficulty against Anish Giri in the penultimate round, but that didn’t mean he had to play 30…Rd3??
31.Rd1! was a cute “cross-pin” of the rook, which has nowhere to go.
Then, in the final round, Vassily Ivanchuk spent four seconds deciding where to put his attacked bishop before coming up with 18…Bd8??
Alas, on the back rank it cuts communication between the queen on a8 and the e8-rook, meaning Bologan’s 19.Nd4! simply wins the c6-knight.
That miniature helped Viktor Bologan to the top performance on 1st board | photo: Hrafn Jökulsson, official website
At least Vassily’s teammates went on to win the match against Moldova, though fifth place was a little disappointing for 2nd seeds Ukraine.
Perhaps part of the explanation for Ivanchuk’s mishap was
that the final round followed the tradition of big chess events in starting
early – a whopping four hours early! The main justification is to allow time
for the closing ceremony and other final day events, while knocking players out
of their daily rhythm just when the stakes are highest is merely a bonus 
And so it’s over. The next big chess feast on the menu is the London Chess Classic, the final event of the 2015 Grand Chess Tour. The first round starts on Friday 4th December, and we’ll of course have full coverage here on chess24.
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