Team 'Oh Yes My Queen' Wins With Queen Trap Vs. 'Dandinavian,' Advance To Semifinals

Team "Oh Yes My Queen," IM Eric Rosen and WGM Nemo Zhou, won their 2024 Team Chess Battle 2 quarterfinal match 2-0 against Team 'Dandinavian,' IM Danny Rensch and IM John Bartholomew. Although Chess.com's Chief Chess Officer blamed the outcome on his former teammate GM Anish Giri, who is not participating, in the second game his team lost after getting their queen trapped—how perfectly fitting, considering the team names.

The next quarterfinal match will be GM Pepe Cuenca and IM David Martinez ("Ratata Spanish Squad") vs. IM Kostya Kavutskiy and IM David Pruess ("ChessDojo"). That begins on Thursday, October 10, at 12:00 p.m. ET / 18:00 CEST / 9:30 p.m. IST.

Team Chess Battle 2 Bracket

Team "Dandinavian" 0-2 "Oh Yes My Queen!"

Host WGM Dina Belenkaya started the interview immediately with a dig at Rensch, asking if he was prepared to be a better teammate than he was last year with Giri. His partner, Bartholemew, backed him up though: "I can imagine being on a team with Anish is a bit challenging, he seems like a strong personality."

I can imagine being on a team with Anish is a bit challenging, he seems like a strong personality.

—John Bartholemew

Minutes later, Rensch reminded Zhou of a casual blitz game that she's since forgotten about ("That's how much it stings," said Rensch) before saying that his team would let the chess speak for itself. The chess did speak, though he might not have liked what it had to say.

Danny: "As Hans would say, we're here to let the chess speak for itself and then we'll see what happens after that!"#TeamChess pic.twitter.com/5UAm4mewXs

— chess24 (@chess24com) October 9, 2024

Both teams practiced the day before, discussing their moves while playing against strong opponents. Normally, this would be against Chess.com's Fair Play policy, but Chess.com can approve exceptions to the Fair Play policy for partner streamers in such circumstances as unrated games and speedrun accounts. Opponents were made aware that they were playing a team and all opponents who lost rating were refunded their points after.

Rosen and Zhou proudly stated that they defeated the strong GM Illya Nyzhnyk in their practice session. Zhou also offered an extra wager: loser buys dinner the next time they meet. Rensch agreed, pointing out that the chances of all four players meeting in person anytime soon are safely low.

Oh Yes My Queen won the first game with the black pieces, though there was plenty off-the-board fire as well—for both sides. Rosen's fire alarm went off, literally, and he left Zhou to carry the team temporarily:

And not too long after, Bartholemew's computer froze with the blue screen of death, leaving Rensch on his own. "We could tell, we could really tell," mentioned Zhou later, alluding to his quality of play, though in fairness Rensch actually outplayed the other side all on his own over the next few moves.

After all four players were back at the board, White broke through on the e-file and could have won the game with 35.Rxd5, but Bartholemew admitted, "We got too cute with it" with 35.Kf2? instead. They lost control and it was Black who crashed through with the kingside pawn majority and finding the only winning move 60...Ng2! as the slam dunk.

"Any adjustments for game two?" Belenkaya asked between the games, to which Bartholemew responded: "We're gonna win... and hopefully keep our computers up and running." Team Dandinavian was in a must-win situation with the black pieces.

They played the combative Sicilian Defense, but White went for the solid Alapin Variation—a decision Rensch complimented after the match. Black pushed their passed pawn all the way down to White's third rank but then decisively blundered with 20.Qa5?? 21.a3!, a tactic that Zhou spotted for her team. Both Rensch and Bartholemew missed that 21...Qxa3 22.Ra1 traps the queen, though they went into it anyway since the alternative 22...Nc6 lost a piece for nothing.

Like the match before, the conversion in the second game was much less clean than the first. Players can sometimes fall asleep at the wheel when they only need a draw, and indeed they blundered a piece and nearly blundered the queen to a skewer at one point. They did, ultimately, win the game with checkmate.

"As long as we didn't blunder our queen, that's what matters," said Rosen after the match, and what's curious is that even if they did blunder the queen with his intended 72.Kd3? (which Zhou caught and corrected), it would still be a draw.

Bartholemew and Rensch leave the event with $500 as a team. Rensch said, "We were trying to give you good training for the next round" and also gave his former partner and frenemy a shout-out:

"Today was @anishgiri's fault," says @DanielRensch.#TeamChess pic.twitter.com/tFoukH34zv

— chess24 (@chess24com) October 9, 2024

We'll see Oh Yes My Queen again next Thursday in the Semifinals, where they will take on the winning team in the matchup Check De India vs. Team Swole.

Team Chess Battle is an event where two-player teams can freely communicate while facing other teams in a series of rapid chess games. Eight teams of two players each compete in a single-elimination bracket. Matches consist of two games (the Final is a four-game match) with a 15+10 time control. The event goes from October 7 to October 18 and features a $10,000 prize fund.

Previous coverage:

• Quarterfinals: Mother-Daughter Duo Overcome Team ChessKid, Advance To Semifinals
• Team Chess Battle Is Back With Levy Rozman, Anna Cramling, James Canty, And Other Celebrities