Annual international junior chess tournament in Uppsala, Sweden
Yevgenij Roshka from Ukraine has 7.5 points out of 8 and lead with 1.5 points before the final round in Uppsala Young Champions. Roshka is thus already a clear winner in despite a round remaining. Congratulations!
In Uppsala GM, Roshka’s countryman Egor Bogdanov has impressed and has the possibility to take a GM-norm if he can manage at least a draw in the last round against Thomas Ernst from Sweden..
Here you can follow the last rounds, start 30/10 at 16.00
There is hardly any Swedish chess player, at least not among the amateurs, who plays as many competitions as Max Wahlund from Linköping. But Uppsala GM is his first Grandmaster Tournament!
At the opening and during the first round the photographer Lars OA Hedlund visited the tournament. See his pictures here.
Parallel to Uppsala Young Champions, this year also a grand master tournament – Uppsala GM – is played, where several Swedish players are given the opportunity to meet really strong opposition and also take norms in IM or GM titles.
Four players from Ukraine, one each from Russia and Belarus and four Swedes form the team and they a round robin tournament. The Swedes are GM Thomas Ernst from Uppsala, FM Theodor Kenneskog, Stockholm, FM Tom Rydström, Växjö and the joker Max Wahlund from Linköping.
Wahlund is one of Sweden’s most active players and regularly writes on the blog INTE BARA SCHACK. He is even doing that during this tournament!
As tradition offers, a strong blitz tournament was played on Sunday evening during the Uppsala Young Champions. Most of the players in the competition took part in the blitz, and together with some local players it became a very strong and exciting competition.
The winner, with 8 wins and just three draws in the eleven rounds, was FM Jung Min Seo from Stockholm. And second came IM Li Min Peng from Ukraine. Winners of the rating groups were Adrian Söderström and Gabriel Bergqvist. Congratulations!
After five rounds of this year’s Uppsala Young Champions, 18-year-old Yevgeniy Roshka from Ukraine is in the lead. In the fifth round, he defeated top-ranked Norwegian Sebastian Mihajlov, who had previously been unbeaten.
Roshka plays black and has sacrificed a pawn to open lines against Mihajlov’s king. And now he is sacrificing one more to finish the game!
21…f5! 22.exf5 exf5 23.Bxf5 If White doesn’t take the pawn, black continues with f5-f4 and the attack breaks through. But this move doesn’t work either. 23…Rde8! Elegant! 24.Be4 After, for example 24.Qd2 follows 24… Ne3 †! 24…Bxe4 25.Nxe4 Ndf6 26.c5 26.Nfd2 Nxe4 27.Nxe4 Qh7! doesn’t help either. 26…Nxe4 27.Qa6 † Kd8 28.cxb6 Ne3†! and Black won in a few moves.
In the second round of the Uppsala Young Champions, young Uppsala player Julia Östensson surprised the crowd. She entered the competition on a reserve spot, but did not show her clearly higher ranked opponent any respect. Her opponent was Axel Berglind from SK Rockaden in Stockholm and he has previously won, among other things, the Swedish youth championship.
Julia has tried to break through on the queens wing, and has a very dangerous passed pawn on c7. Axel’s counterplay has just been stopped and his latest move 34 … Rg6-g7 is a way to try to exchange one or some of Julia’s attacking pieces. But Julia has seen longer and finishes with elegance:
35.Rxe7 †! Rxe7 36.Rxd6 †! Kxd6 and now it is just for the pawn to take the last step after which the game is decided 37.c8Q Rd7 38.Bc5 † and black resigned.
The first round of Uppsala Young Champions was played on Friday night, and went well. Some of the players came flying directly from other competitions and did not arrive on time, but they will play their first round later in the week instead.
Most of the results went according to plan, but some surprises are worth noting. For example, young Axel Falkevall with black won against Hampus Sörensen and Joar Östlund took a merit victory against significantly higher ranked Arvin Rasti.
As usual, we are happy to welcome players from many nationalities to Uppsala, this year they come from Norway, Denmark, Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Italy, Ukraine and Belarus.
The invitation to this years tournament is now published. Very welcome to submit your entry!