Publisher: Chessbase, 2007, DVD
With this DVD on the Russian Defence (Petroff Defence) Alexei Shirov continues the successful and highly praised series of his best games. Since many players look on the Russian Defence with the suspicion that it is a drawish opening, and one which at the same time is both dry and boring, Shirov has in this DVD set himself the specific task of countering this view of matters. Thus he begins the DVD with a game featuring the Cochrane Gambit. Then of course Shirov concentrates on the solid and recognised lines, and in doing so continually manages to explain their deeper content. But the spectator will draw benefit not only from his remarks on the opening, because Shirov understands so brilliantly how to explain instructively and profitably for the student every phase of the game, with the result that at the end of the DVD on the Russian Defence, you will even have learned a lot about endgames.
Video running time: over 5 hours. Alexej Shirov was born in Riga just like world champion Mihail Tal, and also his playing style reminds many chess fans of the young Tal. In the beginning of the 90ies, a comet-like rise brought the young Latvian to the world top within the shortest of time. Being no older than 22 years, he already had an Elo rating of nearly 2750 and belonged to the absolute elite. Since then Shirov has been one of the best players in the world, delighting all chess fans with original and amazing ideas on the board.
System requirements: Pentium-Processor at 300 Mhz or higher, 64 MB RAM, Windows XP, Windows Vista, DVD drive, mouse, soundcard.
