England rejoined the leaders in the fifth round of the Chess Olympiad at Dresden as the only teams on 100% scores, Germany and Russia, drew 2-2. Alexander Morozevich pressed for the entire game and nearly brought Russia victory but Jan Gustafsson easily held the endgame of rook and h pawn against rook and g pawn and h pawn. England reached 9/10 match points after a 2.5-1.5 win over Italy and their reward is a sixth round match against Russia.

Leaders: Armenia, Germany, Russia, Ukraine, England, Azerbaijan 9/10

David Howell took his personal score to 4.5/5 with another win. Howell achieved little out of the opening with the white pieces but won a pawn with a tactical point and converted his advantage. Nigel Short won smoothly with black but the form of Michael Adams is a concern, he lost to the 16 year old prodigy Fabiano Caruana with the white pieces. Adams rarely loses twice in a row.

M Godena - N Short 38th Olympiad Dresden (5)

1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.d4 d6 4.Nf3 dxe5 5.Nxe5 c6 6.Nd2 g6 7.Bc4 Bg7 8.Ndf3 0-0 9.c3 Nd7 10.Nd3 a5 11.a4 b6 12.0-0 Bb7 13.Re1 e6 14.Bg5 Qc8 15.Rc1 c5 16.Bb5 h6 17.Bh4 Bc6 18.Nde5 Bxb5 19.axb5 cxd4 20.Nxd7 Qxd7 21.Nxd4 Nc7! 22.Nc6 Qxd1 23.Rcxd1 Nxb5 24.Bd8 Re8 25.c4? Na7 26.Nxa7 Rexd8! 27.Rxd8+ Rxd8 28.b3 Rd2 29.Nc6 Rb2 30.c5 Rxb3 31.cxb6 Rxb6 32.Nxa5 Bc3 33.Nc4 Rb4 0-1

England's women, seeded 31 started with a narrow defeat to fourth seeds Georgia but have bounced back with four successive victories including 4-0 victories over New Zealand and Lithuania. IM Dagne Ciuskyte has won all five games.

D Ciuksyte - V Feliciano 38th Olympiad Dresden (2)

1.b3 e5 2.Bb2 d6 3.g3 Nc6 4.c4

The English Opening

4...f5 5.Bg2 Nf6 6.d3 g6 7.e3 Bg7 8.Ne2 0-0 9.0-0 Be6 10.a3 Qd7 11.Qc2 Rae8 12.Nbc3

Both sides have developed sensibly. White's position is a little more flexible and she has a nice square on d5. Now Nc6-d8 and c7-c6 is a plan

12...g5

Black decides to attack and f5-f4 could be dangerous so White counters

13.f4 Ng4 14.Nd5 Ne7 15.Qd2 Bxd5

I don't like this move as it concedes the white squares. Readers may recall D'Costa-Short from the ECC at Liverpool in September where Black got into difficulties 15...c6

16.cxd5 gxf4 17.gxf4 Ng6 18.h3 Nf6 19.Kh2 exf4

creating a weakness on f5, 19...Nh4

20.Nxf4 Nxf4 21.Rxf4 Bh6?!

This piece belongs on g7 21...Qe7

22.Rf3 Nh5 23.Rg1 Rf7 24.Qf2 Bg7 25.Bf1 Kh8 26.Bxg7+ Nxg7 27.e4

27.d4 and Bd3 was good here

27...Ref8 28.Qd4 fxe4?

28...Qe7!

29.Qxg7+! 1-0

Round 5 News by Mark Crowther

I've got the live TV from the official site up. Looks great using something called Tadaah which you have to download. I imagine its pronounced Ta-Dah! like at the end of a magic trick. The camera focused on Naiditsch - Kramnik and the interesting thing was the way, once they achieved the drawn position how they blasted out half a dozen moves in very little time to reach the target of 30 moves and get the draw agreed.

Alexander Morozevich should be top board for Russia on rating but there is no better player against players outside the elite but he's been nominated board 4 where he can do most damage. Russia were relying on him for a win after three draws against Germany but in the end Jan Gustafsson survived the test. The game was interesting in that with black and little to work with Morozevich really did put his opponent under pressure. Thus Germany and Russia both lost the final 100% records in the main Olympiad.

Michael Adams lost against Fabiano Caruana in a rather odd looking game. In the past every board counted but the new scoring system where match points count the most it won't matter than much, England had already secured a match victory with wins from Short (with black) and David Howell and a draw on bottom board.

There were also wins for Armenia over the Netherlands and Azerbaijan over Norway, where Carlsen was held by Mamedyarov on top board. India got back in the saddle after a loss to Russia with a win against Austria. In spite of a huge Elo rating advantage China only just squeezed past Scotland who are having a very good event (although perhaps it shouldn't be a huge surprise, if you have the experience of Colin McNab on board four just how bad can your team be?). Down amongst the dead men on board 25 the USA overcame Hong Kong 4-0. (the USCF site thinks they won 3.5-0.5 but I'm pretty sure that's wrong. More impressive is that they have Ian Rogers writing for them http://main.uschess.org/). I was impressed how the big guns of Kamsky and Nakamura still turned out for this fixture where the Hong Kong bottom board was about my strength. Must have been nice for them to catch such a fixture nevertheless.

Vassily Ivanchuk converted bishop and rook against rook against Peter Leko in the only decisive game between the Ukraine and Hungary in 127 moves (the decisive blunder was on move 124! when Leko had a single move to draw). It was one of the last games to finish, but not the very last, there was a rook and knight vs rook ending in the women's event.

Its a rest day on Tuesday. Which given I had to compile TWIC today is a nice little rest for me too.

A question to ponder on the rest day. What do you think http://www.revolutiononline.com/ all about? As advertised on the Olympiad website.

38th Olympiad Dresden (GER), 13-25 xi 2008 Leading Round 5 Results 17th Nov 2008. 2pm GMT start.
Br.	11	GER Germany 1 (GER)	Elo	2-2	1	RUS Russia (RUS)	Elo
1.1	GM	Naiditsch Arkadij	2678	½-½	GM	Kramnik Vladimir	2772
1.2	GM	Khenkin Igor	2647	½-½	GM	Grischuk Alexander	2719
1.3	GM	Gustafsson Jan	2634	½-½	GM	Morozevich Alexander	2787
1.4	GM	Fridman Daniel	2630	½-½	GM	Jakovenko Dmitry	2737
Br.	9	ARM Armenia (ARM)	Elo	2.5-1.5	20	NED Netherlands (NED)	Elo
2.1	GM	Aronian Levon	2757	½-½	GM	Van Wely Loek	2618
2.2	GM	Akopian Vladimir	2679	½-½	GM	Smeets Jan	2604
2.3	GM	Sargissian Gabriel	2642	1-0	GM	Stellwagen Daniel	2605
2.4	GM	Petrosian Tigran L	2629	½-½	GM	LAmi Erwin	2610
Br.	5	HUN Hungary (HUN)	Elo	1.5-2.5	2	UKR Ukraine (UKR)	Elo
3.1	GM	Leko Peter	2747	0-1	GM	Ivanchuk Vassily	2786
3.2	GM	Polgar Judit	2711	0-1	GM	Karjakin Sergey	2730
3.3	GM	Almasi Zoltan	2663	1-0	GM	Eljanov Pavel	2720
3.4	GM	Balogh Csaba	2616	½-½	GM	Volokitin Andrei	2659
Br.	19	NOR Norway (NOR)	Elo	1-3	4	AZE Azerbaijan (AZE)	Elo
4.1	GM	Carlsen Magnus	2786	½-½	GM	Mamedyarov Shakhriyar	2731
4.2	GM	Agdestein Simen	2588	0-1	GM	Gashimov Vugar	2703
4.3	GM	Lie Kjetil A	2526	½-½	GM	Huseynov Gadir	2650
4.4	IM	Hammer Jon Ludvig	2522	0-1	GM	Mammadov Rauf	2631
Br.	15	ENG England (ENG)	Elo	2.5-1.5	44	ITA Italy (ITA)	Elo
5.1	GM	Adams Michael	2734	0-1	GM	Caruana Fabiano	2640
5.2	GM	Short Nigel D	2642	1-0	GM	Godena Michele	2517
5.3	GM	Howell David W L	2593	1-0	IM	Shytaj Luca	2472
5.4	GM	Jones Gawain C B	2548	½-½	IM	Brunello Sabino	2455
Br.	13	IND India (IND)	Elo	3-1	54	AUT Austria (AUT)	Elo
6.1	GM	Sasikiran Krishnan	2694	½-½	GM	Ragger Markus	2518
6.2	GM	Harikrishna P	2659	1-0	GM	Kindermann Stefan	2517
6.3	GM	Ganguly Surya Shekhar	2603	1-0	IM	Atlas Valery	2465
6.4	GM	Geetha Narayanan Gopal	2548	½-½	IM	Neubauer Martin	2422
Br.	21	POL Poland (POL)	Elo	3.5-0.5	66	CRC Costa Rica (CRC)	Elo
7.1	GM	Socko Bartosz	2631	1-0	GM	Ramirez Alejandro	2533
7.2	GM	Miton Kamil	2604	½-½	IM	Gonzalez Bernal	2432
7.3	GM	Wojtaszek Radoslaw	2599	1-0	IM	Valdes Leonardo	2401
7.4	GM	Bartel Mateusz	2602	1-0	IM	Hernandez Basante Francisco	2247
Br.	3	CHN China (CHN)	Elo	2.5-1.5	46	SCO Scotland (SCO)	Elo
8.1	GM	Wang Yue	2736	½-½	GM	Rowson Jonathan	2596
8.2	GM	Bu Xiangzhi	2714	½-½	GM	Aagaard Jacob	2528
8.3	GM	Wang Hao	2696	1-0	GM	Shaw John	2469
8.4	GM	Li Chao B	2622	½-½	GM	McNab Colin A	2455
Br.	37	VIE Vietnam (VIE)	Elo	2-2	16	CUB Cuba (CUB)	Elo
9.1	GM	Nguyen Ngoc Truong Son	2567	½-½	GM	Dominguez Perez Leinier	2719
9.2	GM	Le Quang Liem	2583	½-½	GM	Bruzon Batista Lazaro	2623
9.3	GM	Dao Thien Hai	2510	½-½	GM	Quezada Perez Yuniesky	2580
9.4	CM	Nguyen Van Huy	2422	½-½	GM	Hernandez Carmenates Holden	2580
Br.	32	DEN Denmark (DEN)	Elo	0.5-3.5	8	ISR Israel (ISR)	Elo
10.1	GM	Hansen Lars Bo	2570	0-1	GM	Gelfand Boris	2719
10.2	GM	Nielsen Peter Heine	2662	½-½	GM	Avrukh Boris	2657
10.3	IM	Rasmussen Allan Stig	2513	0-1	GM	Postny Evgeny	2674
10.4	IM	Glud Jakob Vang	2444	0-1	GM	Rodshtein Maxim	2609
Br.	12	ESP Spain (ESP)	Elo	2-2	23	BLR Belarus (BLR)	Elo
11.1	GM	Vallejo Pons Francisco	2664	1-0	GM	Azarov Sergei	2613
11.2	GM	Illescas Cordoba Miguel	2604	0-1	GM	Zhigalko Sergei	2592
11.3	GM	Khamrakulov Ibragim S	2580	½-½	GM	Aleksandrov Aleksej	2617
11.4	GM	San Segundo Carrillo Pablo	2564	½-½	GM	Fedorov Alexei	2584
Br.	28	SLO Slovenia (SLO)	Elo	0.5-3.5	6	BUL Bulgaria (BUL)	Elo
12.1	GM	Beliavsky Alexander G	2619	½-½	GM	Topalov Veselin	2791
12.2	GM	Pavasovic Dusko	2597	0-1	GM	Cheparinov Ivan	2696
12.3	GM	Lenic Luka	2569	0-1	GM	Delchev Aleksander	2632
12.4	IM	Borisek Jure	2548	0-1	GM	Iotov Valentin	2532
Br.	35	LTU Lithuania (LTU)	Elo	0.5-3.5	14	ROU Romania (ROU)	Elo
13.1	GM	Kveinys Aloyzas	2533	0-1	GM	Nisipeanu Liviu-Dieter	2684
13.2	GM	Rozentalis Eduardas	2577	½-½	GM	Istratescu Andrei	2633
13.3	GM	Sulskis Sarunas	2572	0-1	GM	Lupulescu Constantin	2594
13.4	IM	Zagorskis Darius	2509	0-1	GM	Vajda Levente	2582
Br.	22	SRB Serbia (SRB)	Elo	1.5-2.5	7	FRA France (FRA)	Elo
14.1	GM	Ivanisevic Ivan	2658	½-½	GM	Bacrot Etienne	2705
14.2	GM	Solak Dragan	2595	½-½	GM	Vachier-Lagrave Maxime	2716
14.3	GM	Perunovic Milos	2580	½-½	GM	Fressinet Laurent	2676
14.4	GM	Vuckovic Bojan	2561	0-1	GM	Tkachiev Vladislav	2664
Br.	24	CRO Croatia (CRO)	Elo	1-3	30	SWE Sweden (SWE)	Elo
15.1	GM	Palac Mladen	2583	0-1	GM	Agrest Evgenij	2574
15.2	GM	Kozul Zdenko	2593	0-1	GM	Hillarp Persson Tiger	2543
15.3	GM	Zelcic Robert	2589	½-½	GM	Cicak Slavko	2564
15.4	GM	Stevic Hrvoje	2588	½-½	GM	Carlsson Pontus	2515
Br.	25	SVK Slovakia (SVK)	Elo	1.5-2.5	17	GEO Georgia (GEO)	Elo
16.1	GM	Movsesian Sergei	2732	½-½	GM	Jobava Baadur	2664
16.2	GM	Ftacnik Lubomir	2571	0-1	GM	Izoria Zviad	2610
16.3	GM	Markos Jan	2557	½-½	GM	Mchedlishvili Mikheil	2615
16.4	GM	Petrik Tomas	2487	½-½	GM	Pantsulaia Levan	2580

38th Olympiad Dresden (GER), 13-25 xi 2008 Leading Round 5 of 11 Standings
Rg.	Snr	Team	Team	Anz	+	=	-	Wtg1	Wtg2	Wtg3	Wtg4
1	1	Russia	RUS	5	4	1	0	9	825	320	130
2	9	Armenia	ARM	5	4	1	0	9	805	290	155
3	11	Germany 1	GER1	5	4	1	0	9	775	280	145
4	4	Azerbaijan	AZE	5	4	1	0	9	740	270	150
5	2	Ukraine	UKR	5	4	1	0	9	730	310	120
6	15	England	ENG	5	4	1	0	9	620	250	140
7	21	Poland	POL	5	4	0	1	8	725	250	155
8	13	India	IND	5	4	0	1	8	680	280	135
9	30	Sweden	SWE	5	4	0	1	8	680	260	135
10	17	Georgia	GEO	5	4	0	1	8	670	280	125
11	14	Romania	ROU	5	4	0	1	8	670	250	135
12	6	Bulgaria	BUL	5	4	0	1	8	645	230	155
13	3	China	CHN	5	4	0	1	8	640	270	135
14	8	Israel	ISR	5	3	2	0	8	600	240	135
15	29	Bosnia & Herzegovina	BIH	5	4	0	1	8	580	220	135
16	7	France	FRA	5	3	2	0	8	540	230	135
17	5	Hungary	HUN	5	3	1	1	7	730	280	130
18	20	Netherlands	NED	5	3	1	1	7	705	300	125
19	19	Norway	NOR	5	3	1	1	7	680	330	115
20	12	Spain	ESP	5	3	1	1	7	650	290	125
21	37	Vietnam	VIE	5	3	1	1	7	645	260	145
22	27	Greece	GRE	5	2	3	0	7	640	270	130
23	10	United States of America	USA	5	3	1	1	7	615	290	130
24	23	Belarus	BLR	5	3	1	1	7	580	270	120
25	16	Cuba	CUB	5	3	1	1	7	575	270	120
26	41	Germany 2	GER2	5	3	1	1	7	560	270	120
27	45	Iceland	ISL	5	3	1	1	7	545	240	135
28	38	Philippines	PHI	5	3	1	1	7	535	260	110
29	52	Finland	FIN	5	3	1	1	7	530	220	140
30	26	Moldova	MDA	5	3	1	1	7	495	250	120
31	59	Colombia	COL	5	3	1	1	7	495	230	130
32	25	Slovakia	SVK	5	3	0	2	6	630	290	135
33	22	Serbia	SRB	5	3	0	2	6	560	280	120
34	28	Slovenia	SLO	5	3	0	2	6	520	280	115
35	36	Switzerland	SUI	5	3	0	2	6	520	240	120
36	50	Turkey	TUR	5	2	2	1	6	495	240	120
37	46	Scotland	SCO	5	3	0	2	6	490	270	120
38	35	Lithuania	LTU	5	2	2	1	6	480	270	115
39	24	Croatia	CRO	5	3	0	2	6	475	250	110
40	55	Bangladesh	BAN	5	3	0	2	6	465	220	125
41	49	Egypt	EGY	5	3	0	2	6	460	240	125
42	130	Pakistan	PAK	5	2	2	1	6	450	210	125
43	44	Italy	ITA	5	3	0	2	6	445	280	105
44	66	Costa Rica	CRC	5	3	0	2	6	440	260	115
45	32	Denmark	DEN	5	3	0	2	6	430	280	105
46	43	Latvia	LAT	5	2	2	1	6	430	230	120
47	70	Mongolia	MGL	5	3	0	2	6	400	220	120
48	71	New Zealand	NZL	5	3	0	2	6	400	180	110
49	84	South Africa	RSA	5	2	2	1	6	395	220	115
50	54	Austria	AUT	5	3	0	2	6	390	220	115
154 teams

38th Olympiad Dresden Women (GER), 13-25 xi 2008 Leading Round 5 of 11 Standings
Rg.	Snr	Team	Team	Anz	+	=	-	Wtg1	Wtg2	Wtg3	Wtg4
1	3	China	CHN	5	5	0	0	10	970	300	160
2	8	Hungary	HUN	5	4	1	0	9	755	270	155
3	1	Russia	RUS	5	3	2	0	8	790	290	150
4	16	Romania	ROU	5	4	0	1	8	750	280	150
5	4	Georgia	GEO	5	3	2	0	8	740	330	120
6	17	Netherlands	NED	5	4	0	1	8	690	280	130
7	6	Armenia	ARM	5	4	0	1	8	685	290	130
8	2	Ukraine	UKR	5	3	2	0	8	685	240	135
9	9	Poland	POL	5	4	0	1	8	675	320	130
10	31	England	ENG	5	4	0	1	8	630	240	150
11	7	United States of America	USA	5	4	0	1	8	625	230	145
12	43	Uzbekistan	UZB	5	4	0	1	8	620	260	135
13	36	Austria	AUT	5	4	0	1	8	580	240	135
14	11	India	IND	5	3	1	1	7	680	310	120
15	10	Serbia	SRB	5	3	1	1	7	650	270	125
16	21	Israel	ISR	5	3	1	1	7	630	290	120
17	14	Slovenia	SLO	5	3	1	1	7	605	260	140
18	24	Vietnam	VIE	5	3	1	1	7	570	250	130
19	38	Switzerland	SUI	5	3	1	1	7	545	240	130
20	28	Azerbaijan	AZE	5	3	1	1	7	530	270	115
21	13	Bulgaria	BUL	5	3	1	1	7	520	230	135
22	47	Mongolia	MGL	5	3	1	1	7	505	240	110
23	33	Italy	ITA	5	3	1	1	7	490	240	135
24	12	Germany 1	GER1	5	3	1	1	7	470	220	110
25	25	Cuba	CUB	5	3	0	2	6	675	270	145
26	5	France	FRA	5	3	0	2	6	630	280	135
27	18	Czech Republic	CZE	5	3	0	2	6	560	280	125
28	22	Spain	ESP	5	3	0	2	6	520	280	120
29	15	Slovakia	SVK	5	3	0	2	6	510	290	120
30	44	Colombia	COL	5	3	0	2	6	500	260	130
114 teams