ChessBase

• Jerusalem: Svidler, Anand, Nepomniachtchi, and Erigaisi in the semi-finals

  At the second Jerusalem Chess Festival, Arseniy Nesterov and Evgeny Alekseev qualified for the Masters as the best players in the Open and faced ten invited participants there. Svidler, Anand, Nepomniachtchi and Erigaisi advanced from the round-robin tournament of the Masters to the knockout stage. The semi-finals and finals will be played today. | Photos: Tournament website/ Alon Shulman

• Attacking and sacrifice games

  Ed Schröder, pioneer of chess engine programming, has in his retirement turned his attention to a new and very exciting project: to extract games from a database collection that are especially aggressive – that are short and have daring sacrifices and king attacks. He shows us the kinds of result you can get. Best of all: you can download the utility and use it on your databases.

• London Chess Classic: There is no stopping Abdusattorov!

  Nodirbek Abdusattorov secured at least a share of first place at the London Chess Classic by earning his sixth straight win in round seven, defeating Luke McShane in a hard-fought Ruy Lopez. With a two-point lead over Alireza Firouzja and only two rounds remaining, the Uzbek grandmaster is close to securing overall victory. The remaining games were drawn, including an enterprising effort by defending champion Gawain Maroroa Jones against Michael Adams. | Photo: Amruta Mokal (Freestyle Chess Grand Slam)

• 100th Argentine Championship: Oro fighting for first national title

  In the 100th edition of the "Campeonato Argentino Superior" in Buenos Aires, seven-time national champion Diego Flores, 12-year-old prodigy Faustino Oro and 2021 champion Federico Pérez Ponsa are locked in a battle for first place. Flores is leading the standings, with Oro and Pérez a half point back. To get his second GM norm, the "Messi of chess" needs to score 3/3 in his final games. | Pictured: Faustino Oro at a press event with Jorge Macri, the head of government of Buenos Aires | Photo: Organisers, David Llada.

• Clash of Generations: Vachier-Lagrave v. Erdogmus in Monte Carlo

  A six-game classical match in Monte Carlo will see Maxime Vachier-Lagrave face 14-year-old Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus from 3 to 8 December, in an event organised by the Monaco Chess Federation with support from Evren Ucok. The encounter brings together an established top-20 grandmaster and Türkiye's leading junior. The format mirrors the match Erdogmus played against Peter Svidler in Marseille earlier this year, where he impressed in the classical section. | Photos: Official website

• On Akiba Rubinstein’s 145th Birthday

  145 years ago, on 1 December 1880, Akiba Rubinstein was born, perhaps the strongest player of his time who never had the chance to play a World Championship match. For more than 20 years, Rubinstein was one of the leading players in the world, but his life took a tragic turn.

• Rebel and playing style in chess

  Ed Schröder is a pioneer in chess programming. In the 1990s his program Rebel won a number of World Championships in computer chess, and always had a special place in the community, due to its playing style. In 2003 he retired from competitive computer chess, only releasing freeware versions of Rebel. Now Ed has come out of retirement and is undertaking some interesting new projects – like extracting the most interesting games from historical databases. And he is sharing them with us.

• Riddle: Korchnoi-Karpov 1978

  As chess players occasionally do, Alex Fishbein, the U.S. grandmaster, was recently looking at a classic game from the past: Viktor Kortschnoj's victory over Anatoly Karpov in the 21st game of their 1978 match. Something was wrong. Charles Sullivan had done some intense research on this volatile encounter and asks for your assessment on the results he presents.

• FIDE World Cup, Finals - Live!

  Today marks the final day of the World Cup in Goa, which began on October 31. But the key question of who will play in the Candidates Tournament in March and April 2026 has already been settled: Wei Yi, Javokhir Sindarov and Andrey Esipenko are in. Now it’s “only” a matter of deciding who wins the tournament. That will be determined today in the tiebreak between Wei Yi and Sindarov. The winner takes home the title and 120,000 USD, the runner-up receives 85,000 USD. | Follow the action live with expert commentary starting at 10.30 CET (5.30 ET, 15.00 IST)

• Ivan Sokolov: Understanding Middlegame Strategy Vol 12: Reversed Colour Systems – King’s Indian/Pirc Defence

  Ivan Sokolov’s new course examines colour-reversed King’s Indian and Pirc structures, showing how extra tempi influence typical plans and why these positions feel uncomfortable for humans but not for engines. He analyses key model games from Kramnik, Botvinnik, and Fischer, demonstrating that White usually gets a pleasant setup without a guaranteed advantage, leading to sharp, dynamic battles decided by understanding rather than theory. The course equips practical players, both with white and black, with clear ideas, typical patterns, and concrete plans for navigating these complex reversed-colour systems.