World Youth Chess Championship 2014 Part 1

World Youth 2014 at the ICC-Durban

This post will encompass my first six games of the World Youth Chess Championship 2014. After game six we had a break day. The tournament was held at the International Conventional Center (ICC) in Center City, Durban, which is a large modern building that sits across the street from the African National Congress (ANC) headquarters. The ANC has a decade-long history of fighting injustices against black people in South Africa. It is the ruling government party in the country today.

I played in the under-14 section (u14). There were under-8 to under-18 sections, skipping two years between each. So there were players from almost every age up to 18, even including a four year old from China in the under-8 section!

After each short round post I will include the game in a link.The only one I did not include was the first round, as I can't seem to find the notation for that game. Also you can download all of them in one pgn at the bottom of the page. In-depth analysis is included for the top and most interesting games.

Also if you don't have a chess application and want to view the games and my analysis with a chess application, I would recommend the free program Scid. Just open the pgn with Scid and you'll be able to follow the games and my analysis with a 2d chess board. Get it here: http://scid.sourceforge.net/



Round 1

One Zimbabwe chess player in their colorful team jacket (you can see me behind him waiting for my opponent)

 In this tournament I had the pleasure to play both the highest and the lowest ranked players. This round I played number 101, the top (but only) player from Swaziland! It was very interesting to play against somebody from Africa, unfortunately the game wasn't as interesting and I lost the notation.


Round 2

Waiting with Harsha for our game to begin

This round I got to play the No. 1 player from India, Harsha Barathakoti, rated 2297 Fide! This game I played black. Overall I blame my troubles for one stupid move I made, after that everything went downhill, although I could have defended much better. Even though I lost, it was still a pretty good game, and Harsha played very well after he got the upper hand.

Click this link to download the pgn of the game:
Harsha Barathakoti - Angel Hernandez-Camen

Round 3

Before my game with Yuantai Luanchen

It seemed a little suspicious that a player from China was only rated 1500 Fide (the top player from China won the u14 section!), so I was sure not to underestimate Yuantai Luanchen. However he didn't prove himself in the opening and played much too passive. All in all it was a fairly easy game.

Click this link to download the pgn
Angel Hernandez-Camen - Yuantai Luanchen

Round 4
On board 10, this was my second try against a top player, this time from Italy rated 2334 , but it didn't end up being any more successful than the first. I got into a passive but solid position and he got the slight upper hand. However he ended up being greedy, snatching a pawn, which I failed to take advantage of and quickly found myself in a lost position. I basically let him checkmate me and that was that.

Click this link to download the pgn of the game:
Luca Moroni - Angel Hernandez-Camen

Round 5

Again I got dropped to the low rated bunch, this time I played u14 #18 from South Korea and Number 1 from South Korea in this tournament. I got nervous by how solid positionally he was playing, but then I got him with a tactical punch.

Angel Hernandez-Camen - Chon Yongjoon

Round 6

This game was potentially the best game that I've ever played. I played against Quenti Burri, the top French u14 player rated 2312, who acted very cocky before the game. He was joking with the French #2 (who is right next to him) and he obviously thought it was going to be an easy game. Little did he know...

Click this link to download the pgn of the game:
Quenti Burri - Angel Hernandez-Camen

Click this to download all the games I played before the free day!
World Youth 2014 Games Part 1