chess

With the outstanding exception of Matthew Sadler, who won an individual gold medal for the best performance on board four, the English team was simply too solid to challenge the Russians at the Chess Olympics.

Short, Adams and Speelman all performed competently, but the par result was always three draws and a win for Sadler - and you need more than 21/2-11/2 victories to hope for the gold medals.

Only at the very end did Nigel Short climb out of a trough of draws, when he won well against Leonid Yudasin and Judit Polgar in the final rounds. Here Short using a favourite line against the Caro-Kann to build a space advantage, then launch a decisive attack.

Short-Yudasin:

1 e4 c6 2 d4 d5 3 e5 Bf5 4 Nf3 e6 5 Be2 Ne7 6 0-0 Bg6 7 c3 Nd7 8 Nh4 c5 9 Nd2 Rc8 10 Nxg6 hxg6 11 Nf3 Qb6 12 Rb1 a6 13 b4 cxd4 14 cxd4 Nf5 15 g4 Nh4 16 Nxh4 Rxh4 17 b5 a5 18 Be3 f5 19 Rc1 Rb8 20 Bg5 Rh7 21 gxf5 exf5 22 Bf3 Be7 23 Qd2 Bxg5 24 Qxg5 Rh6 25 Qf4 Rd8 26 Bxd5 Nf8 27 Rc5 Nd7 28 Rc2 Nf8 29 Rc5 Nd7 30 Rc4 Qxb5 31 Bg8 Rh8 32 Qg5 Rxg8 33 Qxg6+ Ke7 34 Qd6+ Ke8 35 Qe6+ Kf8 36 Rfc1 Qb6 37 Qxf5+ Ke7 38 d5 Qh6 39 d6+ Ke8 40 e6 Nf6 41 Rc8 Qh5 42 Rxd8+ Kxd8 43 e7+ Ke8 44 Rc8+ 1-0