Wednesday 18 November 2015

A less successful king walk

One of Nigel Shorts most celebrated game his his famous win against Jan Timman, where he marched his king up the board to assist in a mating attack. However, for every successful king walk, there are probably 100 times as many king 'drags' where the unwilling monarch is forced to walk the plank.
An example of such a situation occurred yesterday in the European Teams Championship, and Short was on the wrong end of the score line. Playing Hrant Melkumyan from Armenia, Short had his king forced up the board, starting on g2 on move 39 and reaching f8 by move 48. After that it was not long for this world, getting checkmated on e6, and move 50.


Short,Nigel D (2686) - Melkumyan,Hrant (2632) [A10]
European Team Chess Championship 2015 - Reykjavik (4.3), 16.11.2015


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