In the Dutch Championship, Erwin l’Ami and Roeland Pruijssers qualified directly today. Against l’Ami, Sergei Tiviakov had to win, but his attempt to unbalance the position right after the opening backfired. l’Ami took the initiative and didn’t let go, and eventually won with an elegant trick. Roeland Pruijssers, who had taken the lead so fortunately yesterday against Erik van den Doel, held his own in a quiet game in which Van den Doel, of course, did try for a long time.

Lucas van Foreest drew even with Black in the match with Robby Kevlishvili – an admirable achievement. He treated a Najdorf Sicilian better than his opponent, who does know his way around in this type of position. In the first tiebreak game, however, Kevlishvili struck again with a win. In the second game, Van Foreest didn’t get a chance; Kevlishvili soon got an advantage with Black and eventually forced the winning draw.

Max Warmerdam didn’t accomplish much against Dimitri Reinderman’s original positional play in the regular game; it was a long game in which the balance was never really broken. It didn’t happen either in the first rapid game of the tiebreak, but in the second game, Warmerdam struck. He obtained a solid little advantage, and was ‘massaging’ his opponent for a while, until Reinderman succumbed and lost material. Warmerdam will face Kevlishvili in the semifinal, and l’Ami faces Pruijssers.

At the Women’s Championship, one dramatic event was almost as horrible as that of Van den Doel yesterday. Although the consequence wasn’t elimination, Robin Duson did throw away a full point. Against Anne Haast, Robin was better in the entire game, until deep in the endgame, but then she committed a humungous blunder that cost a full rook. The favourite, Eline Roebers, took the sole lead with an excellent win against Maaike Keetman. Her rival Machteld van Foreest got no further than a draw in a game with Anna-Maja Kazarian that had been swishing up and down rather heavily.

In the Open, the fifteen-year-old leader Pranav Anand, the current U16 World Champion, defeated Sjoerd van Roon in an exciting game. Anand sacrificed an exchange for the initiative, but it wasn’t correct. However, at some point Van Roon missed a winning move, and then the young Indian took over with a series of creative moves and won the game. Also the game on board two, between the German grandmaster Hagen Poetsch and Ruud van Meegen, was highly interesting. Poetsch too sacrificed an exchange after many complications, and his attack crashed through.

Midas Ratsma is the revelation of the tournament so far. With his Elo of just over 2200 he is causing trouble for one (theoretically) stronger opponent after the other. Today, he held the Slovakian master Stefan Macak in his clutches for hours in an interesting ending, but the latter managed to narrowly save the draw. Sixteen-year-old Loek van der Hagen also continues to do well – he held the three-years-older Tim Grutter to a draw.