The following games were played at the 2014 Qatar Masters, Doha, where 92 grandmasters were participants. The tournament was won by Chinese grandmaster Yu Yangyi.
Teenage Surinamese chess player Geryen Dos Ramos (right) and Trinidad and Tobago’s Mikel Martin,13, contested a furious middle-game battle during their Round 9 encounter at the 2014 Guyana Umada Chess Cup. It was the last game of the tournament to be completed before the prize-giving ceremony, and, therefore, it commanded the attention of the entire tournament hall. Geryen was calm, since he possessed a connected passed pawn. Mikel temporarily blocked the pawn with a Rook, thereby tying-up a major piece in the process. With his remaining pieces however, Mikel launched a sudden and vigorous attack on Geryen’s king, proceeding to deliver some thunderbolts against his steadfast opponent. Mikel’s mom, a chess player herself, was photographing the different moods of her son as he was launching his attack. “Mikel can draw that position,” Mom said to no one in particular. “Yes, it’s a draw,” she reasoned. But Mikel was in time trouble. And time trouble could be suicidal when you are attacking. He was forced to play quickly, eventually losing some more pawns and ultimately losing the game. Afterwards, Mom was tender in her assessment of the game on behalf of Mikel: “You know, he’s only 13; he has a long way yet to go,” she said. Geryen is the son of Dr Richard Dos Ramos, who played chess in Guyana in the 1970s and ’80s, along with his brother Carlos. We still remember the game when Gordon Broomes checkmated Richard with two Bishops, as he (Gordon) was experiencing severe time trouble!
Vachier-Lagrave v Efimenko
White: Maxime Vachier-Lagrave
Black: Zahar Efimenko
Cuban-Guyanese chess player Maria Varona-Thomas (left) is photographed defeating Trinidad and Tobago’s Candidate Master Aditi Soondarsingh in Round 9 of the 2014 Guyana Umada Cup chess tournament. Maria, rated at FIDE 1738, finished the tournament in sixth place with 5.5 points, the same number of points as Loris Nathoo, Wendell Meusa, Su Hai Feng, and Surinamese Frank Kim Lin Lo and Geryen Dos Ramos. Anthony Drayton was adjudged the best Guyanese player of the Challenger’s section of the tournament with his unassailable 6.5 points, finishing in 4th place, just under Jamaica’s Woman International Master Deborah Richards who also accumulated 6.5 points. Maria demonstrated excellent form in the earlier rounds of the tournament outplaying Su Hai Feng, Frank Kim Lin Lo, and Suriname’s Calvin Finke before drawing with Jamaica’s Andrew Mellace. She stopped Kriskal Persaud when he seemed to be on a rampage. Before that encounter, Kriskal had beaten Drayton. Maria represented Guyana at the 2014 Tromso Olympiad on fourth board.
Akopian v Giri
