Gawain Jones Wins European Online Blitz Chess
He defeated Alexei Shirov in the final match.
An exciting event took place online on 18th-20th of December. European Online Blitz Chess Championship 2020 with a prize fund of 12.000 € was organized by European Chess Union and Silesian Chess Federation.
In the final day, despite the unconditional fights, both matches - Shirov Alexei (ESP) vs Bluebaum Matthias (GER) and Jones Gawain (ENG) vs Navara David (CZE) ended in a tie 2-2. Draw of lots provided by the arbiters, took us to the most tense format - Armageddon game (time control 5’ vs 4’ with no increment).
In an Armageddon game between Navara David and Jones Gawain, White made a terrible blunder on the 30th move - Rd6. Jones sacrificed his queen for a rook and played 31. … a2! Navara was unable to stop the pawn from promoting. In the end, the English Grandmaster got an extra rook on the board and got promoted to the finals.
Shirov Alexei got Black pieces against Bluebaum Matthias, where he equalized the position in the opening and his opponent didn’t have the chance to create some complications. The game ended in Shirov’s favour and he joined Jones in the final battle for the title.
The final match between Jones Gawain and Shirov Alexei has ended in Jones’ favour a round before. After a tie in the first round, Jones managed to celebrate victory two games in a row. In the third game of the final match, Jones with a spectacular rook sacrifice weakened the opponent’s king in the center, leaving him without any chances.
In the match for the bronze medal, Navara David missed his chances in a winning rook endgame and lost the first round against Bluebaum Matthias. In the next 2 games, the German player won 1.5 points and got the third place.
Final list of winners:
Jones Gawain (ENG) – 2500 €
Shirov Alexei (ESP_ – 2000 €
Bluebaum Matthias (GER) – 1500 €
Navara David (CZE) – 1000 €.
The medalists got trophies, medals and invitations for the upcoming European Rapid & Blitz 2021, which will be held in Katowice, Poland.
All qualifiers from the Top16 got prizes. The players ranked from the 5th - 8th place received a prize of 500 €, players from the 9th-16th place – a prize of 300€, while the players ranked 17th-20th received the invitations for 2021.
Special prizes were considered for the best 3 female players: Stefanova Antoaneta (BUL), Sargsyan Anna M. (ARM) and Socko Monika (POL), each receiving 200€.
An invitation for the upcoming European Rapid & Blitz Chess Championship 2021 received the best senior players: Bykhovsky Avigdor (RUS), Efimov Igor (MNC) and Mazi Leon (SLO).
The best junior players: Deac Bogdan-Daniel (ROU), Garayev Kanan (AZE), Kacharava Nikolozi (GEO) and Sargsyan Anna M. (ARM) are also invited for the 2021 European Rapid & Blitz Chess Championship.
A large number of spectators followed the live commentary in English by WGM Keti Tsatsalashvili, GM Marcin Tazbir and WFM Maria Leks at the Polish national channel on Twitch TVP_Sports and the commentary in Polish provided by Infoszach.
The organization of the championship was supported by the city of Katowice, the Ministry of Sport of the Republic of Poland and Mokate.
About Katowice
Katowice is one of the fastest growing Polish cities which passed a deep restructuring in a short time. For the first time, the European Rapid Chess Championship in Katowice took place in 2017 and was certainly one of the greatest events in the history of the European Chess Union. The great organization of the competition back in 2017 made it possible for Katowice to receive the right to host the participants of the European Rapid Chess Championships in 2020 and 2021.
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