More Bundesliga Brilliancies As Baden-Baden Wins Title
On Sunday OSG Baden-Baden earned their 14th Bundesliga title in 15 years by winning the round-robin championship tournament in Karlsruhe, Germany. Many players returned to over-the-board chess for the first time in months and seemed quite inspired as lots of great games were played.
As explained in our previous report, which focuses on GM Richard Rapport's lovely win vs. GM Noel Studer, this year's Bundesliga was organized as a one-week tournament because of the pandemic. The 2019-2020 season was interrupted after the matches in February and is now planned to be resumed in early 2021 to provide next year's champion.
For this year, eight teams voluntarily agreed to play a single round-robin in Karlsruhe during September 16-20, with double rounds on two of the five playing days. Top favorite Baden-Baden managed to win yet another title but not without a fight that lasted until the very end.
Bundesliga 2020 | Final Standings
| # | Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | MP | BP | BW | |
| 1 |  |
OSG Baden-Baden | 4½ | 6½ | 5 | 6 | 7 | 7 | 7 | 14 | 43 | 182½ | |
| 2 |  |
SC Viernheim | 3½ | 5 | 6 | 5 | 5½ | 6 | 7 | 12 | 38 | 167 | |
| 3 |  |
Schachfreunde Deizisau | 1½ | 3 | 5 | 6½ | 4½ | 5 | 7½ | 10 | 33 | 142½ | |
| 4 |  |
SV Werder Bremen | 3 | 2 | 3 | 4½ | 5 | 5½ | 6 | 8 | 29 | 132 | |
| 5 |  |
SG Solingen | 2 | 3 | 1½ | 3½ | 5 | 7 | 5½ | 6 | 27½ | 125 | |
| 6 |  |
FC Bayern München | 1 | 2½ | 3½ | 3 | 3 | 5 | 5½ | 4 | 23½ | 111 | |
| 7 |  |
SF Berlin | 1 | 2 | 3 | 2½ | 1 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 16½ | 79 | |
| 8 |  |
Aachener SV | 1 | 1 | ½ | 2 | 2½ | 2½ | 4 | 1 | 13½ | 69 |
Baden-Baden wasn't certain of the title until the start of Sunday's last round against SC Viernheim. Having added lots of board points, 4-4 would be enough. The match was an absolute thriller.
Viernheim was close to creating a huge upset but eventually had to be satisfied with second place. The match saw draws on the first five boards and a loss for GM Etienne Bacrot vs. GM Sergey Fedorchuk, but wins for Baden-Baden's GMs Paco Vallejo and Arkadij Naiditsch secured another championship title.
| # | SC Viernheim | 3½-4½ | OSG Baden-Baden | ||||
| 1 | GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov | 2764 | ½-½ | GM Fabiano Caruana | 2835 | ||
| 2 | GM Vladimir Malakhov | 2669 | ½-½ | GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave | 2778 | ||
| 3 | GM Yuriy Kryvoruchko | 2682 | ½-½ | GM Levon Aronian | 2773 | ||
| 4 | GM Anton Korobov | 2688 | ½-½ | GM Richard Rapport | 2760 | ||
| 5 | GM David Anton Guijarro | 2688 | ½-½ | GM Michael Adams | 2706 | ||
| 6 | GM Bassem Amin | 2686 | 0-1 | GM Francisco Vallejo Pons | 2710 | ||
| 7 | GM Igor Kovalenko | 2645 | 0-1 | GM Arkadij Naiditsch | 2624 | ||
| 8 | GM Sergey Fedorchuk | 2615 | 1-0 | GM Etienne Bacrot | 2673 |
It was Naiditisch who became the match winner as he won the last game of the match from a highly sharp position. He was an exchange up in a middlegame with opposite-colored bishops. Although both kings seemed to be in trouble, Kovalenko was running out of checks.
One of the many great videos from the Grenke YouTube channel.
Although 4-4 wouldn't have been enough for Viernheim, it was definitely a possible result as GM David Anton missed a forced mate in 10 against GM Michael Adams:
Lots of nice games were played in Karlsruhe, and a special mention should go to Dutch GM Erwin l'Ami. Now mostly busy as the second of GM Anish Giri, the 35-year-old grandmaster scored two nice results in a row. First, there was this spectacular draw against Mamedyarov in round three.
After this narrow escape for the Reykjavik 2015 winner, an even bigger result awaited him. Having lost the three earlier games he had played with GM Fabiano Caruana, l'Ami finally got the white pieces and beat him for the first time in what was another incredibly sharp encounter.
And what about Rapport? Well, after his win vs. Studer, he won another nice game against l'Ami's compatriot, GM Loek van Wely, these days a senator in the Dutch parliament. It must be said that White was doing well before he was tricked:
A great day! We became German Champions with Baden-Baden team, my Boston Celtics are fighting back in NBA and it's sunny in Karlsruhe! pic.twitter.com/RJMtdPPZeV
— Levon Aronian (@LevAronian) September 20, 2020
Congratulations to my team!!
— Viswanathan Anand (@vishy64theking) September 21, 2020
Bundesliga 2020 | All games
The Bundesliga was held September 16-20, 2020 in Karlsruhe. The time control was 90 minutes for 40 moves followed by 30 minutes for the rest of the game and a 30-second increment from move one.
See also:
Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
Peter's first book The Chess Revolution is out now!
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