Six rounds have already been played at the European Individual Chess Championship 2023 in Vrnjacka Banja Serbia, with GM Anton Korobov (UKR, 2659) and IM Stamatis Kourkoulos-Arditis (GRE, 2520) sharing the top position after scoring 5.5 points each.

A group of eight players follow the leaders sitting on 5/6: GMs Thai Dai Van Nguyen (CZE, 2651), Vitaliy Bernadsnkiy (UKR, 2611), Ruslan Ponomariov (UKR, 2655), Giga Quparadze (GEO, 2483), Frederik Svane (GER, 2577), Alexey Sarana (FIDE, 2688), Nijat Abasov (AZE, 2625) and Benjamin Gledura (HUN, 2637). With five rounds to go it is still wide open. 

The ECU President Zurab Azmaiparashvili opened Round 6, wishing a happy International Women's Day to all female participants, arbiters, and volunteers of the Championship. He also wished a happy birthday and many returns to our Chief Arbiter Tomasz Delega.

GM Anton Korobov made a draw with the black pieces against Czech GM Thai Dai Van Nguyen. The opponents split a point after just 20 moves of play, though GM Thai Dai Van Nguyen had a slightly better position according to engines. 

Korobov joined the live studio after the game, explaining that his opponent offered him a draw in a position where he felt extremely uncomfortable.

IM Stamatis Kourkoulos-Arditis (pictured below) defeated the two-time Azerbaijani Champion GM Eltaj Safarli (AZE, 2608) to catch up with Korobov. It was an exciting game in which Safarli had everything under control up to some point. However, the Azerbaijani GM first missed the strongest continuation 22.Nxf6 and two moves later, made a mistake with 24.Rf6?! allowing Kourkoulos-Arditis to grab the initiative. There was no comeback for Eltaj Safarli, who was forced to resign in the 33rd move.

The 7th round starts today at 15:00 CEST and will see the leaders' clash. 

The top 10 pairings:

1. Korobov, Anton (5½) – Kourkoulos-Arditis, Stamatis (5½)
2. Abasov, Nijat (5) – Sarana, Alexey (5)
3. Bernadskiy, Vitaliy (5) – Ponomariov, Ruslan (5)
4. Svane, Frederik (5) – Nguyen Thai Dai Van (5)
5. Gledura, Benjamin (5) – Quparadze, Giga (5)
6. Kadric, Denis (4½) – Sargissian, Gabriel (4½)
7. Navara, David (4½) – Mastrovasilis, Dimitrios (4½)
8. Pechac, Jergus (4½) – Moussard, Jules (4½)
9. Predke, Alexandr (4½) – Iskandarov, Misratdin (4½)
10. Esipenko, Andrey (4½) – Brkic, Ante (4½)

Text and photos: official website

Official website: eicc2023.com/