Ruan Lufei - Alexandra Kosteniuk

Anastasia: the game Lufei-Kosteniuk was drawn. My question is to Alexandra. Were you satisfied with the opening?

Alexandra: Of course it was quite comfortable to play. I had an extra pawn. Though there were more drawing chances than winning chances. Still I am not very much satisfied with the result, with the way I handled this advantage. I think I could have created more problems to my opponent. At some point it seemed to me that I was almost winning after Rad8. There was a forced line. I think instead of g4 takes h5, I could have played 32.Bg5. And the only move could have been R8d5. Then it could have been possible to play e6. But i did not see anything after fe, fe and then Kf8. So, I spent some time to think over that possible variation. I had a feeling that I might have something better if I chose this line. But I could not see something exact during the game.

Ruan: I think the opening was good for me. I chose that line in the opening today because after 2 losing games it was important not to lose one more and make a draw at least. Although I lost one pawn in the endgame, it still seemed to me that the game will be drawn. As for Alexandra's opinion about Bg5, I think R8d5 is loosing because of moves 33. c4 Rd4 34.e6 fe 35.fe kf8 36.e7 ke8 37. a5. I saw only one position that could save the situation : 32...f6 on 32.Bg5, then 33.ef ef 34.Bf6 Rf3 35.Kg1 Rg3 36. kh2 R8d3.

Alexandra: Perhaps I should have tried it. It seems to be very close. Even the position could be still drawish after the possible line Ruan was proposing, I should have tried it. Maybe it was my only chance.

Hou Yifan continues dominating in the tournament. Today she won against Ekaterina Kovalevskaya playing Black. The game Danielian - Stefanova also finished in favour of Black. Anna Muzychuk playing White with Alisa Galliamova took advantage after her opponent's mistakes and added one more point to the score sheet. The other games (Kosteniuk-Lufei, Kosintseva N. - Koneru, Kosintseva T. - Lahno) were drawn: three out of them had Spanish Defense in the opening. 

  Tomorrow Tatiana Kosintseva who occupies the second place in the tournament will face the leader of the tournament Hou Yifan. Only two weeks ago Tatiana Kosintseva and Hou Yifan met at the chess board in the Women's Super tournament in China: at that time the Russian Chess player managed to defeat the World Champion. 

GM HOU YIFAN vs GM ELINA DANIELIAN

IM ALISA GALLIAMOVA vs GM ALEXANDRA KOSTENIUK

IM ALISA GALLIAMOVA - WGM RUAN LUFEI