Mirror, Mirror

A curious incident occurred in round 8 of the Isle of Man Grand Swiss. Alexei Shirov played Yu Yangyi on board seven, and Sergey Karjakin faced Alexey Dreev on board eight. After 19 moves, the two games were exactly identical!

 

Spot the difference… 😂 #iomchess pic.twitter.com/CO7GHV1vf8

— Fiona Steil-Antoni (@fionchetta) October 18, 2019

It was clear that the players were considering the moves on the other board in making their own decisions (how could they not?), as was later confirmed in a tweet by Karjakin. Bizarrely, Karjakin and Yu (diagonally opposite each other!) had even played the same variation against each other four years ago.

The chief arbiter Alex Holowczak stepped in and moved the Shirov-Yu board to another room. There was no accusation of cheating, but rather, in his own words,

“I saw Yu Yangyi sort of look quite nervous when he [looked] over to Dreev, who made a move maybe a minute or so before. So I thought in the interest of everybody feeling comfortable with the game it was better to just move it to the second hall so that nobody can accuse anyone of anything.”

Quite a few strong players took to social media afterwards to express their disagreement. Personally, I think Alex’s decision was sensible and justified. Yu had the most reason to feel nervous, given that Karjakin was the best-prepared of the four of them, and so Yu’s opponent stood to benefit the most from the situation. In any case, none of the players themselves seemed to have a problem with the decision. Eventually, Karjakin won, while the other game was drawn.

I think most experienced players have a story or two that relates to these rare ‘mirroring’ situations. They used to be more common in the pre-computer era, when grandmasters would often repeat a variation many times in the same tournament while taking sides in a theoretical ‘debate’. These arguments – such as whether the Classical King’s Indian was winning for White, or whether Black could safely take the poisoned pawn in the Najdorf – could remain disputed for a long time, whereas today any amateur with a phone can quickly find the answer!

I have two curious mirroring stories. The first dates back to the 2006 Tilburg Open. I ended up sharing first prize after drawing a controversial blitz finish against the infamous GM Normunds Miezis, but that’s another story. In the fourth round, I was white against the Dutch IM Robert Ris on board 4, while on board 3, IM Thomas Willemze was white against GM Sipke Ernst. We all knew each other quite well, and there was plenty of banter before the game started (as in common in congenial Dutch weekenders!).

Both games started out with the Four Knights’ Opening, but while Tommy put his bishop on b5, met by Sipke’s 4…Bd6, I played the unconventional 4.a3!?. With a grin, Robbie mirrored his neighbour with 4…Bd6, and after six moves we reached the following positions (my game is on the right):

   

Now, Sipke’s 4…Bd6 makes some sense in response to 4.Bb5: It protects e5 in case of Bxc6, and also prepares a future plan of …Ne7, c7-c6 (hitting the bishop!) and Bd6-c7. But this doesn’t make sense if the white bishop is on c4! Indeed, while the other game lasted a marathon 85 moves, mine continued with 6…h6 7.g4! and finished in just six more:

The second story came a decade later, at the 2015 Australian Open. In round 7, I beat FM Jack Puccini in a heavily tactical McCutcheon French. It was a very sharp variation that I had analysed at home, and I was proud to bash out my novelty and win a tactical skirmish. The end of the game had a lot of spectators, including a talented junior called Yi Liu. In the next round, Yi played my same McCutcheon variation against his opponent, who unwittingly followed Jack’s moves. By move 20, a crowd had gathered around this lower board to see Yi with full time on his clock, casually repeating my moves in the extremely sharp position. Every spectator (myself included!) was clued in to the situation, except, unfortunately, for Yi’s nervous and very confused opponent. A few moves later, Yi’s opponent had resigned, whereupon he was filled in on why the kibitzers had been murmuring.

Unfortunately, the organisers never entered the games, and I lost my scoresheets from the event, so I can’t recall the exact position. But I guess that just increases the chances that it happens again…