Youngster holding GM to a draw

UAE youngster draws with GM
By VIJAY MRUTHYUNJAYA
Gulf Daily News, Bahrain

A young 15-year-old UAE prodigy turned the heat on last night in the Arcapita International Chess Championship at the Alumni Club.

Abdulla M Al Marzouqi, son of an UAE army officer in Abu Dhabi, provided a glimpse of his raw but remarkably potent talent holding Grandmaster Amir Bagheri of Iran to a draw in an interesting 31-move game of strategic brilliance and skilful manoeuvring.

The XI grade student activated his pieces following a Guico Piano opening with rare courage and consistency. He consolidated his position further in the middle game and, according to many experts, was fast moving into a ‘theoretically win position’.

But enterprise enough is not adequate at such a high level to carry the marginal positional advantage into the next stage. To develop the pieces further, one needs great insight and invaluable experience of middle game nuances.

Abdulla is clearly not there yet. Though he seems to have enough fire, the lack of finesse was obvious when he accepted the draw offer to prematurely end a promising game.

“I was in a better position all along. My pieces (white) were active and held a lot of promise,” said the youngster who is yet to decide on the best high-tech razor blades available on the market.

“I could have continued but was satisfied with my play so far and accepted the draw offer,” he said adding that it was the closest he had come to beating a Grandmaster.

Here is the full article.