Urii Eliseev Wins Moscow Open But Loses Game Of The Tournament
This year's Moscow Open was surprisingly won by the young grandmaster Urii Eliseev, whose loss in round seven was spectacular.
Photo courtesy of the Moscow Open.
The famous Aeroflot Open was revived last year, but without hiatus the Moscow Open has been going strong since 2005.
Held at the Russian State Social University from January 28-February 8, the Moscow Open was a huge festival with all kinds of tournaments for students, youngsters, veterans and even a championship for composing.
The total prize fund was 4.730 million rubles (€ 55,000/$61,000), and 1,500.000 rubles (€ 17,300/$19,300) was reserved for the “A Tournament.”
Speaking of solving, according to his Russian Wikipedia page Eliseev became the world champion in problem solving at the age of 12. But the 2013 Russian U16 Champion, now a 19-year-old grandmaster rated 2582, played in the A Tournament and won it!
He finished in shared first place with an even more surprising name: FM Dmitry Gordievsky. Eliseev had the better tiebreak of the two, who finished on 7.5 points.
Trailing by half a point was a group of seven players which included well known grandmasters such as Anton Korobov, Ernesto Inarkiev, Vladislav Artemiev and Artyom Timofeev.
It was Timofeev who was responsible for Eliseev's only loss, in round seven. That was arguably the game of the tournament, with four queens on the board for several moves:
Urii Eliseev (7.5/9) won the Moscow Open! His one loss was the game of the event :) https://t.co/uxMvSdKq0P #c24live pic.twitter.com/4HEPTmkSr1
— chess24.com (@chess24com) February 7, 2016
Before the last round, 2015 winner Inarkiev was in an excellent situation. He was in clear first place with seven points, and got a “lucky” pairing against Gordievsky.
However, that turned out quite differently. The FM must be getting a higher title soon as his rating is already above 2500 and he played a nearly perfect game in that last round:
The playing hall. | Photo courtesy of the Moscow Open.
Eliseev finished his tournament with a great game as well. He beat the Hungarian GM Gergely Antal from a Rossolimo Sicilian using the following combination:
2016 Moscow Open | A Tournament, Final Standings (Top 20)
| Rk. | SNo | Title | Name | FED | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 |
| 1 | 11 | GM | Eliseev Urii | RUS | 2582 | 7,5 | 52,5 | 48,5 | 7 |
| 2 | 29 | FM | Gordievsky Dmitry | RUS | 2506 | 7,5 | 47 | 43 | 7 |
| 3 | 1 | GM | Korobov Anton | UKR | 2710 | 7 | 60,5 | 55 | 5 |
| 4 | 12 | GM | Timofeev Artyom | RUS | 2570 | 7 | 54 | 49,5 | 6 |
| 5 | 3 | GM | Artemiev Vladislav | RUS | 2673 | 7 | 52,5 | 49 | 6 |
| 6 | 2 | GM | Inarkiev Ernesto | RUS | 2676 | 7 | 52 | 49 | 6 |
| 7 | 55 | IM | Moskalenko Alexander | RUS | 2442 | 7 | 52 | 48,5 | 6 |
| 8 | 7 | GM | Kokarev Dmitry | RUS | 2619 | 7 | 51,5 | 48 | 6 |
| 9 | 71 | IM | Korchmar Vasiliy | RUS | 2405 | 7 | 50,5 | 47,5 | 6 |
| 10 | 22 | IM | Ivanov Oleg V | UKR | 2519 | 6,5 | 49,5 | 46,5 | 5 |
| 11 | 6 | GM | Khismatullin Denis | RUS | 2626 | 6,5 | 47,5 | 43,5 | 6 |
| 12 | 10 | GM | Ponkratov Pavel | RUS | 2591 | 6,5 | 47 | 43,5 | 5 |
| 13 | 34 | GM | Gasanov Eldar | UKR | 2488 | 6,5 | 46,5 | 44 | 4 |
| 14 | 4 | GM | Grachev Boris | RUS | 2652 | 6,5 | 46,5 | 43 | 4 |
| 15 | 91 | FM | Shevchenko Kirill | UKR | 2373 | 6,5 | 46,5 | 42,5 | 5 |
| 16 | 40 | IM | Iljiushenok Ilia | RUS | 2470 | 6,5 | 46 | 41,5 | 4 |
| 17 | 76 | IM | Vorontsov Pavlo | UKR | 2395 | 6,5 | 45,5 | 42,5 | 5 |
| 18 | 74 | GM | Naumkin Igor | RUS | 2403 | 6,5 | 44,5 | 41 | 5 |
| 19 | 52 | IM | Tran Tuan Minh | VIE | 2447 | 6,5 | 44,5 | 40,5 | 6 |
| 20 | 39 | Triapishko Olexandr | RUS | 2471 | 6,5 | 40,5 | 37,5 | 5 |
(Full final standings here.)
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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