African style lion grip

The MRCF friends team outplayed players from Zimbabwe in a friendly match with a score of 209:113

The international events where the Moscow Region Chess Federation takes place happen so often that it is worth to dress up a real events calendar for such purposes. On august 23 the MRCF friends team took place in a friendly match against players from Zimbabwe which was organized in a very short time.

The Russian senator, multiple world champion and the president of MRCF Sergey Karjakin pointed out: “It is good to see that the project nicknamed “Chess diplomacy in Africa” which started in the beginning of this year, becomes bigger every month. After successful matches against chess players from Togo and Mozambique we start our collaboration with colleagues from Zimbabwe. I am sure that this match is just a start towards a fruitful chess dialogue. Our federations are now in the process of preparing a Memorandum of cooperation that will allow players and coaches from Zimbabwe to gain new heights, improve their level of chess and set up regular games and meetings with the Russian colleagues”.

The MRCF executive director Albert Minnullin told about the new team of friends: “The team was set up a short time ago and it unites chess amateurs of different age and level. These are not only players representing the region, but other subjects of the Russian Federation, coaches, students of sports schools and players from friendly countries. During the matches that the players of the chess club of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs played against teams from ASEAN states, Togo and Mozambique many friends of the Federation showed their eagerness to play in such an event. Of course we could not leave their demands without feedback, so at the end of the day we formed a big team of people who really love chess!”

The Zimbabwe Chess Federation president Mapingire Todd could not hide his emotions after what he saw: “1.5 hours flew like a second. The game was very sharp. I can’t even remember such a fight in a friendly match. The opponents played showing no compromise. The games lasted till the kings were left without a single pawn. Unfortunately, this time we had to suffer a defeat but our players learnt a lot and passed a wonderful training which will allow to avoid mistakes in the future. We are impatient to continue our chess collaboration with the Russian friends. The match was great and we are looking forward to another match!”

Commenting on the match the chief arbiter FM Konstantin Bazarov said: “I would like to thank everyone for their fair play. In many games the fight was sharp, players used Berserk mode and the results was unclear till the very last moment. Only 7% of games ended in a draw and that tells a lot about the character of such a play. I would like to congratulate the MRCF friends team with their honorable result! Such friendly tournaments are very good to strengthen ties between partners and relations between federations from different countries”.

“Arena” format match lasted 1.5 hours. 122 games consisting of 9161 moves were played during that time. It is worth mentioning that 30% of all games were played using Berserk mode, a special mode allowing to get more match points in case of victory but with only half of time and no 3 seconds increment.

The match was accompanied by comments made by CM Mikhail Strovsky in Russian.