ETCC Round 5 - Russia heads for the title

Russia blew out Azerbaidjan 3,5 points to 0.5 with three fantastic wins GM Svidler, GM Morozevich and GM Alekseev, while GM Grischuk finished tie on third board. Now Russia is has a two point lead from all other teams and it's very unlikely that they will lose this advantage in the games that follow

Ukraine and France did not manage to give us a winner, the game finished 2:2, where GM Bacrot won against GM Ivanchuk, who is probably still very tired from the rapid with GM Leko last week, GM Karjakin won against GM Tkachiev and the other two games finished a draw

Bulgaria made a hard draw with the Czech Republic - after GM Cheparinov lost his game on board one to the quickminded GM Navara and the games on board two and four were going for a tie, GM Delchev saved the day for the Bulgarian team by winning against GM Babula

In a rather mixed game Israel managed to overtake team Netherlands with the minor one point advantage 2.5:1.5 mostly thanks to GM Michael Roiz (on board three), who won his fourth game in a row and now ranks second in the individual standings with 100%success (4 wins out of 4 matches)

Sweden vs. Slovenia - 1.5:2.5 - Slovenia won with minor advantage with a total of 3 draws and a win by IM Lenic against GM Hillarp Persson on board three

Turkey and Armenia showed almost equal strength with tree draws, but GM Akopian succeeded in taking the game against GM Atalik and the higher rated team of Armenia won by one point difference - Turkey:Armenia - 1.5:2.5

England, lead by GM Michael Adams and Spain, headed by GM Alexei Shirov, finished a 2:2 draw. The games on board one (Adams/Shirov) and four were tie and GM Vallejo Pons (ESP) and GM Hebden (ENG) won their games on boards two and three respectively. We should mention that GM Francisco Vallejo Pons ranks fifth in the individual standings with 4 points out of 5 games.

Denmark could not stop the strong Hungarian attack and finished with one draw on board one between GM Nielsen and GM Gyimesi and three losses amounting to 0.5:3.5

Serbia:Poland - 0.5:3.5 - Poland played an outstanding match and crushed Serbia. GM Markus managed to take a draw from GM Wojtaszek in order to make the loss a little less painful

FYROM and Croatia brought us the third 2:2 draw in round five. They exchanged a win and a loss and made two ties on board three and four

GM Carlsen's Norway took a decisive win over GM Kulaots' Estonia with points on board one and two and draws on the rest. Estonia:Norway-1:3

Greece came out victorious over Italy with 3.5:0.5 having only GM Caruana wining a draw for the Italian team on board two.