The Sportland NRW Cup goes into the fifth round today on four boards instead of five. IM Vadym Petrovskyi is ill and his game against FM Hussain Besou (photo) will be played in the morning in the coming days. Petrovskyi expects to be back at the board tomorrow. We wish him a speedy recovery!

Last year, in the absence of Vladimir Kramnik, he already stunned the spectators and experts with his tournament victory in the NC World Masters of the Sparkassen Chess Trophy. Now Dmitrij Kollars first tournament game was against the 10-time Dortmund winner.

Top seed Gabriel Ruhmann suffered his first defeat in the B-Open today on the first board: Dr. Bukrhard Behle won the game with White. All in all, it was a combative morning: no draws on the first 8 boards. So there are now 6 players left with full points with 4 out of 4.

The fourth tournament of the Sparkassen Chess Trophy 2023 started on Monday: Sebastian Junker, board member of Sparkasse Dortmund, made the symbolic first move at the board of Pavel Eljanov against Vladimir Kramnik. Eljanov won the last two grandmaster tournaments in Dortmund, Kramnik is the undisputed record holder with 10 victories.