Gelfand v Nakamura

By Stabroek News On In Daily Features |
At the end of Round Five in the World Team Championship, Hikaru Nakamura, playing Board One for the USA, had scored 4.5/ 5 (four wins and one draw) from five games, with a surreal rating performance of 3035.
At the end of Round Five in the World Team Championship, Hikaru Nakamura, playing Board One for the USA, had scored 4.5/ 5 (four wins and one draw) from five games, with a surreal rating performance of 3035.

The World Team Championship 2010 was contested during the period January 3-14 in Bursa, Turkey, and comprised teams from Russia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Israel, USA, India, Brazil, Egypt, Turkey and Greece. Most of the leading players for the tournament were ranked 2700 and over , making it a very strong championship.

In the Israel-USA clash, Hikaru Nakamura, playing Board One for the USA defeated Israel’s Boris Gelfand, ranked number six in the world,  in what has been described as “the game of the tournament.”
Gelfand, B (2761) – Nakamura, Hi (2708)

7th World Team Championship Bursa TUR (5), 9.1.2010
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.Nf3 0-0 6.Be2 e5 7.0-0 Nc6 8.d5 Ne7 9.Nd2 Ne8 10.b4 f5 11.c5 Nf6 12.f3 f4 13.Nc4 g5 14.a4 Ng6 15.Ba3 Rf7 16.b5 dxc5 17.Bxc5 h5 18.a5 g4 19.b6 g3 20.Kh1 Bf8. So far all theory. Now Boris Gelfand plays a new move: 21.d6 axb6 22.Bg1 Nh4 23.Re1

At the end of Round Five in the World Team Championship, Hikaru Nakamura, playing Board One for the USA, had scored 4.5/ 5 (four wins and one draw) from five games, with a surreal rating performance of 3035.

23…Nxg2!! Double exclam for this beautifully unexpected move, and for the courage to play this against the world’s number six player, who is 53 rating points above the American. 24.dxc7? 24…Nxe1 (threatens simply 25…g2 mate!) 25.Qxe1 g2+ 26.Kxg2 Rg7+ 27.Kh1 Bh3. You may be forgiven for feeling a bit nervous about the white pawn poised to take the black queen on d8, but White must attend to the threat of 28…Bxg2 mate first. 28.Bf1 Qd3 (threatening 29…Qxf3+ and mate in one) 29.Nxe5 Bxf1 (threatening once again 30…Bg2#, which is why the white knight cannot touch the hanging queen) 30.Qxf1 Qxc3 31.Rc1 Qxe5 32.c8Q Rxc8 33.Rxc8 Qe6 White Resigns. 0—1. With a piece down White’s position is hopeless.