Gawain Jones Wins Tepe Sigeman & Co Chess Tournament
Gawain Jones became the sole winner of the Tepe Sigeman & Co Tournament in Malmo, Sweden after drawing with his main rival Pentala Harikrishna in the final round on Thursday. The Indian grandmaster ended in second place.
Jones took the sole lead again in the penultimate round as he defeated Tiger Hillarp Persson while Harikrishna drew his game with Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu. Jones nicely refuted a temporary pawn sacrifice as he found the tactical problem behind it:
Nihal Sarin, who had trapped Parham Maghsoodloo's queen so nicely the previous day (see our second report on the event), this time saw his own queen getting into trouble. Nils Grandelius wasn't happy with all his moves in this game, but as soon as he got the chance, his beautiful 23rd move was ruthless.
Jones went into Thursday's final round with half-point lead over his direct opponent, Harikrishna. Obviously the Englishman was happy with the draw he got, but noted: "I didn't want to suffer to make the draw so I tried to play as normally as possible."
Harikrishna felt that the final position offered zero chances for him to play for an advantage: "If it's unclear I would go, but it's not unclear," he said. "That's the problem. Sometimes it happens to me that my common sense prevails!"
Jones had recently joined the "2700 club" and won another 7.2 points in Malmo to reach a live rating of 2709.2.
Thanks for a great event. It was an honour to be invited. I could never have expected the chess to go so well. https://t.co/kbAU2EYGv0
— Gawain Jones (@GMGawain) May 9, 2019
The final round was the only one where all games ended in draws. That included a lucky half-point for Grandelius, who was dead lost against Ivan Saric. The Croatian grandmaster clearly wasn't having his tournament; today at some point the evaluation showed a forced mate in nine.
2019 Tepe Sigeman & Co Tournament | Final Standings
| # | Fed | Name | Rtg | Perf | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | ||
| 1 | Gawain Jones | 2702 | 2817 | ½ | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | 1 | 5.0/7 | |||
| 2 | Pentala Harikrishna | 2730 | 2756 | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | 4.5/7 | |||
| 3 | Nils Grandelius | 2688 | 2710 | ½ | 0 | ½ | ½ | 1 | ½ | 1 | 4.0/7 | |||
| 4 | Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu | 2667 | 2664 | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | 3.5/7 | |||
| 5 | Parham Maghsoodloo | 2671 | 2614 | 0 | ½ | ½ | ½ | 0 | ½ | 1 | 3.0/7 | 9.75 | ||
| 6 | Nihal Sarin | 2598 | 2623 | ½ | 0 | 0 | ½ | 1 | ½ | ½ | 3.0/7 | 9.75 | ||
| 7 | Ivan Saric | 2694 | 2558 | 0 | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | ½ | 0 | 2.5/7 | 9 | ||
| 8 | Tiger Hillarp Persson | 2563 | 2576 | 0 | ½ | 0 | ½ | 0 | ½ | 1 | 2.5/7 | 8 |
The round seven official broadcast.
The Tepe Sigeman & Co Tournament celebrated its 25th edition this year with an extended playing field. Eight players (up from six) were competing in what was now a seven-round tournament, held May 3-9 at Malmo Live in Malmo, Sweden.
Previous reports:
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.”
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