Road to be the Best Chess Player in the World!-Chapter 470: The Evans Gambit Appears Again!

"Oh! What do we have here?!" Bagas was currently jumping in his excitement. "Javokhir Sindarov goes all out since the beginning, using Sheva’s weapon against him! This is the Evans Gambit, the sharpest line for the quiet Italian Opening, and probably also the most unique one! A surprise attack against Sheva, nonetheless! Sindarov really has the guts here!"

"Not a lot of players are brave enough to pull this opening in a classical game, let alone against Sheva, who is quite famous for this." Laysa grinned, also showing the same level of excitement. "This is Javokhir Sindarov’s way to tell Sheva and everyone that he is going for blood today! I like it!"

Yeah, even though this variation was rare, Sheva was not strange to the gambit, having played this quite a lot of times, especially in a faster time control. He was still stunned, though, not expecting that he would receive the end of this someday. Somehow, the boy remembered the last scene of one of the Harry Potter movies that he watched a long time ago.

’You dare to use my weapon against me, Sindarov?!’ He murmured with the slow, dramatic tone, mimicking that character quite well. After that, he shook his head quickly and snorted. ’What the hell am I doing here?!’

Still, if Sindarov was trying to surprise him, Sheva would say that it worked quite well for the Uzbek young man. This made Sheva pause for a second to steal a glance at his opponent, just to find that the man was in a hyperfocus mode, not even getting bothered by the noises from the crowd nearby.

’Yeah, not bad, Sindarov. You catch me off guard here.’ Sheva gave a nod of approval. ’However, this is the opening that I know well, like my own baby! No way I would let you defeat me in this shit!’

With that in mind, after pausing for a while to get back from his shock, Sheva recovered quickly, getting back the lost time by blitzing his move. He decided to go for the accepted gambit, letting himself get led into the position that Sindarov wanted. Not like he had any choice, per se, as declining the gambit was definitely the worst move.

Sindarov also returned all the punches with the same heat, moving so fast that everything was already within his preparation. In just ten minutes, both players had already passed the tenth move of the game, with all the tension on the board being focused on the queenside, where the gambit started.

"Honestly, this is probably the most underrated part of Sheva’s game." Laysa suddenly said.

"Oh? Which part?" Bagas asked.

"His time management," Laysa answered, leaning forward to get a better look at the chessboard on her screen. "You have to know that Sheva always spends so little time in his opening stage, often leads his opponent to do the same. There are always two outcomes in this. First, Sheva’s opponent gets dragged into his tempo and plays hastily, or second, his opponent doesn’t catch the bait, but he is down a lot of time by the point they are in the endgame phase. None of them are good for any player, yet Sheva always manages to get one of them for his opponent in all of his games."

"I can attest that." Anna smiled wryly. "It is so rare to see a player with a quick style that could move so precisely like a computer engine, so Sheva’s opponents always get flustered quite easily. Maybe, the one who could do the same is Ian Nepomniachtchi from Russia, who also has a similar style to him."

"Well, it is fortunate that Nepo is playing in a quite closed circle, right?" Bagas couldn’t help but joke. "That means not a lot of players are getting used to his style!"

Indeed, as one of the most elite players on the planet right now, Nepo didn’t really play a lot of open tournaments. He only accepted invitational tournaments, especially the biggest ones like this tournament or something like the Grand Chess Tour, making it hard for anyone else who was not in that circle to get used to his style.

However, even if Nepo wasn’t like that, Sheva would still be able to thrive with the same playing style. After all, with only two unique players in the community, it would be hard for anyone to get used to it, even though they knew that Sheva would go fast anyway. This was the advantage that a unique player brought after honing their skills for years.

The game still runs quite fast, but after a while, Sindarov finally slowed down, trying to pace himself. Half of the queenside was cleared already, and the Uzbek GM also had already gotten the pawn he gambited in the opening stage earlier. The young man also forced Sheva to have a doubled-pawn, but this was the decision that Sheva himself committed to open up the A file for his rook.

Overall, everything was pretty equal for both sides.

However, Sheva still had a hidden danger on the board. He hadn’t castled and put his king into the safety zone yet, and with the queenside getting exposed, there was no way he would go there. No, it would be a suicidal move.

However, the kingside wasn’t cleared yet, with his knight still in the home square, sitting comfortably. This was the headache that Sheva had right now, as it couldn’t really get out without putting him into a bad situation instantly.

’Oh, well, it is a little bit slow, but I can do it manually.’ Sheva shook his head, trying not to think too much about this problem. ’Still, after the explosive opening, everything is cleared now, and all the attacks are gone already. It seems that we are going to delve into the positional battle, which is definitely his favorite.’

Sheva knew from extensive research that the Italian Opening was Sindarov’s bread and butter. Even though the Evans Gambit was also something that Sheva was familiar with, he wouldn’t say confidently that he was better than Sindarov. However, since they were going to go for the endgame, anyway...

’System, activate the Endgame Master title, please...’