USA's round 7 opponents at the Olympiad: how Armenia and Switzerland play

Short answer

In round 7 of the 46th Chess Olympiad, on 23 September 2026, the United States face Armenia in the open section, on table 2, and Switzerland in the women's section, on table 8. Drawing on 944 classical games broadcast on Lichess over the last three years, this article shows each player's repertoire in both squads, the lines where each scores below their own average, where the engine finds the most errors and what the online repertoire adds — always with the number of games next to each percentage, because that number says how much of the dossier holds up.

Event: 46th FIDE Chess Olympiad

How this was compiled: Researched on 21 September 2026, with round 6 finished and round 7 still to be played: it starts on 23 September at 3 pm Samarkand time (10:00 UTC), after the rest day. The pairings were checked on chess-results; the official PGN with each team's line-up only comes out when the round starts, so this dossier covers both opponents' full squads rather than the four boards. The repertoire uses the 944 classical over-the-board games from the last three years broadcast on Lichess, linked to each player by FIDE ID — 574 from the Armenian squad and 370 from the Swiss. The rapid, blitz and armageddon tiebreak games of the 2025 World Cup, which the broadcast tags with the classical time control, were left out: 18 games across four Armenians. The error profile measures each player's 12 most recent games with Stockfish 19 at depth 16. Every move quoted in the text was re-measured at depth 24, with a dedicated search and a clean hash. The blitz and rapid repertoire comes from verified Chess.com accounts, over a 90-day window.

The essentials in a few lines

• In round 7, on 23 September 2026, the United States face Armenia in the open section (table 2) and Switzerland in the women's section (table 8). Both opponents are unbeaten and one match point ahead of the USA: Armenia have 11 to 10, Switzerland 10 to 9. The line-up only appears in the official PGN when the round starts, so this dossier covers all ten players in both squads.
• All five Armenians answer 1.e4 with 1...e5 in most games. Across 96 games in that reply they won 12, drew 70 and lost 14 — 49.0%, below the Black average of every one of them. Shant Sargsyan drew all 10 of his.
• Shant Sargsyan lost one of his 39 White games in the sample, and the engine found no error of his that changed a result in the 12 most recent. He is the cleanest profile of the ten: 11 centipawns per move in the middlegame and 6 in the endgame.
• Mariia Manko, Switzerland's second board, lost 22 of her 72 White games, against opponents at her own level. The Catalan she plays, 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3, gives her 42.1% in 19 games, a line the dossier flags with high confidence.
• Alexandra Kosteniuk was +7.12 against Marina Brunello in round 6, played today, and played 30.Kh2; the evaluation dropped to +0.28 and the game was drawn. In round 3, Switzerland drew 2–2 with Estonia after Manko lost a level ending and Camille de Seroux let a +6.86 position go.

The round 7 picture

The USA reach the seventh round after beating Norway 2.5–1.5 in the open section and losing 1–3 to India in the women's. In both matches the opponent is ahead. Armenia are unbeaten with 11 match points and 17 game points, against the USA's 10 and 16; their only dropped point was a 2–2 draw with China in round 5. Switzerland are also unbeaten, with 10 match points to the USA's 9 and 18 game points each, after draws with Estonia and the Netherlands.

On rating, the USA are favourites in both. They are top seed in the open and face seed 10; in the women's section they are seed 5 and face seed 17. The table rewards Armenia's consistency more than any single result: five wins and a draw, with no loss, against a USA team that lost 1.5–2.5 to Germany in round 5.

The sample column in the table below says how much of each dossier holds up. Manuel Petrosyan has 184 broadcast classical games in three years, the largest in either match; Camille de Seroux has 24 and Alexandra Kosteniuk 31. None of the ten falls below 10, the point at which the dossier flags low confidence. That is 944 games in total, 574 Armenian and 370 Swiss, after removing the 18 World Cup tiebreak games that the broadcast tagged as classical.

Only Shant Sargsyan has played all six rounds. Martirosyan sat out round 1, Hovhannisyan rounds 2 and 3, Petrosyan rounds 4 and 6; on the Swiss side, Kosteniuk missed round 1 and De Seroux has not played since round 4. Olympiad teams rotate their squads, which is why the dossier covers all five on each side instead of trying to guess four.

Armenia: five grandmasters and one shared answer to 1.e4

What unites this team is not the first move with White but the answer with Black. Against 1.e4, Hovhannisyan played 1...e5 in 26 of 27 games, Petrosyan in 26 of 48, Sargissian in 18 of 22, Martirosyan in 16 of 27 and Sargsyan in 10 of 17. Together that is 96 games, with 12 wins, 70 draws and 14 losses — 49.0%, below the Black average of every one of the five. Sargsyan drew all 10. It is a reply chosen to hold, and it holds: fourteen losses in 96 games against grandmaster opposition is not a hole. What it says is that 1.e4 e5 is where the Armenians give up the least and also win the least.

Inside that reply, the Spanish is where two of them score lowest. After 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5, Hovhannisyan scores 38.9% in 9 games and Martirosyan 38.9% in 9, both with seven draws and two losses. The dossier flags Hovhannisyan's line with medium confidence. Petrosyan and Martirosyan also have the whole 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 complex flagged with high confidence, at 50.0% in 26 and 50.0% in 16 — the largest samples of any weak line in the open section.

When they leave 1...e5, the picture changes completely. Petrosyan scores 86.4% in 11 games with the Sicilian and Martirosyan 100.0% in 6. These are small samples, but they point in the same direction: the Sicilian is the Armenians' fighting reply, and 1...e5 the drawing one. Whoever has White against them chooses, in practice, which of the two games they want.

With White, the squad splits. Hovhannisyan opened 1.e4 in all 63 of his White games and scores 63.5%; against the Caro-Kann he scored 16.7% in 3 games, too few to plan around. Sargissian is his mirror: 1.d4, 1.c4 or 1.Nf3 in all 42 games, never 1.e4. Martirosyan, Sargsyan and Petrosyan use both, and Petrosyan adds 1.Nf3 in 19 of 92.

The table needs one reading adjustment. Petrosyan has the best numbers in the squad — 67.9% with White and 66.8% with Black, with four and seven losses in 92 games each — but his opponents averaged 2408, about 160 points below his 2569. The other four faced opponents averaging between 2525 and 2564. Petrosyan's numbers describe a calendar of opens; the others' come largely from events such as the World Cup and the European Championship. Sargsyan's 67.9% with White and a single loss in 39 games is the more impressive figure, and it came against opponents averaging 2561.

Switzerland: a former world champion and a Catalan that does not work

Alexandra Kosteniuk is the name any preparation recognises, and the dossier has the least to say about her. She has 31 classical games in three years — the Cairns Cup, Biel, team leagues in three countries and this Olympiad — with 67.9% as White in 14 and 50.0% as Black in 17. She opened 1.e4 in 12 of the 14, and against 1.d4 she scores 60.0% in 10. No line repeats three times with a ten-point drop. What stands out is how long her games are: a median of 101 half-moves, with 84% of them passing move 40, the highest share in either match. Against her, the plan has to include a long game.

Mariia Manko has the largest Swiss sample, 139 games, and the most exploitable asymmetry in the match. She opened 1.d4 in 70 of 72 White games and scores 52.1%, with 25 wins and 22 losses — a loss rate of almost one in three with White, against opponents averaging 2242, below her own 2285. Most of it is concentrated in her main line: after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3, the Catalan, she scores 42.1% in 19 games. The dossier flags that line with high confidence. Against the Slav, 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6, it is 25.0% in 6.

With Black, Manko answered 1.e4 with 1...c5 in all 43 games and scores 52.3%. The Rossolimo with 3.Bb5 g6 4.O-O gives her 31.2% in 8 games, flagged with medium confidence. That is two concrete lines, one for each colour, against the same player.

Sofiia Hryzlova is the most varied: 1.Nf3 in 20 White games, 1.d4 in 19, 1.e4 in 14. 1.Nf3 is her best move, at 70.0%. With Black she scores 50.0% in 62, and against 1.c4 she drops to 38.9% in 9 — 10.0% in 5 when she replies 1...e5, with four losses. Ghazal Hakimifard is the opposite: 1.e4 in all 34 White games, with 67.6%, and the Sicilian in all 14 games against 1.e4. Against 1.d4 she scores 45.0% in 10.

Camille de Seroux, the fifth, has the smallest sample, 24 games, and the most surprising number: 35.7% with White in 14 games, against opponents who averaged 2217 outside the Olympiad, above her own 2152. Against the Sicilian as White she scored 25.0% in 6. Fourteen games are few, but the direction is clear enough to note.

Where the engine finds the errors

The table shows the average evaluation loss per move in each phase, with the number of moves measured alongside. The opening column is almost identical across the ten, from 5 to 7: every one of them arrives at the middlegame prepared. The difference between the two squads appears afterwards. The Armenians stay between 11 and 19 in the middlegame and between 6 and 17 in the endgame; the Swiss go from 24 to 36 in the middlegame and from 18 to 37 in the endgame.

Shant Sargsyan's line deserves its own sentence. Eleven centipawns per move over 335 middlegame moves, six over 153 endgame moves, and a worst moment of 221 centipawns, in a position he was still winning and went on to win. The engine found nothing in his 12 most recent games that changed a result. Combined with a single loss in 39 White games, it is the profile of a player who is very hard to beat and who does not give points away.

The Armenians' real errors are few and far from Samarkand. Manuel Petrosyan was level against Niilo Nissinen at Spilimbergo in August and played 30...Qf3: the evaluation went to −7.32 and he lost. Haik Martirosyan went from −0.58 to −3.15 with 27...Nd7 against Jan Malek at Polanica and lost. Gabriel Sargissian let +4.14 go with 23.Na4 against Raem Sherman at the 2026 European Championship and drew. At this Olympiad, the clearest is Hovhannisyan's 15.Rb1 against Diego Flores of Argentina in round 4, from +2.74 to −0.05, in a game that ended drawn and a match Armenia won 2.5–1.5.

The Swiss list is longer and more recent. Today, in round 6, Alexandra Kosteniuk was +7.12 against Marina Brunello of Italy and played 30.Kh2 instead of 30.Nd5; the evaluation dropped to +0.28. Five moves later, 35.h7 took a +6.32 position to +2.82, and the game was drawn. In round 3, against Estonia, two Swiss results changed within the same match. Mariia Manko was at −0.20 against Margareth Olde when she played 40...Ka4, which took the evaluation to −6.36, and lost; Camille de Seroux was +6.86 against Grete Olde and played 33...Re8, which brought it back to zero, and drew. The match ended 2–2.

Sofiia Hryzlova's most expensive moment came in the first round of the 2026 Swiss Women's Championship: level against Gundula Heinatz — today the Swiss team's captain — she played 51.Kd3, the evaluation dropped to −6.06, and she lost. De Seroux's profile has four more errors from level or near-level positions, in the 2026 Mitropa Cup and at the Paul Keres Memorial, which fits her 35.7% with White.

The blunder count stays out of the table: the classification uses the uncapped loss, so a player who is already lost and picks the opponent's fastest mate adds a blunder without having changed anything. Kosteniuk's worst moment at depth 16, at over 98,000 centipawns, is exactly that: a rook ending she was already losing. The average loss per move caps each evaluation at a thousand centipawns and does not suffer from the same problem.

What the online accounts show, and what they do not

This section answers a different question from the previous one, which is why it stands apart. A blitz and rapid repertoire is usually wider than a classical one, and what someone plays with three minutes is not what they prepare for a five-hour game. It tells you what they know and where they feel uncomfortable, not what they will play on Wednesday.

The most revealing case is Shant Sargsyan's. On the sargsyan_shant account, with a GM title verified by the platform, he played 141 games in 90 days and scored 73.9% with White and 59.0% with Black. His most frequent Black opening online is the Modern Defence, in 20 games — a far cry from the 1...e5 with which he drew all ten classical games in the sample. Sargsyan knows another way to meet 1.e4, and chooses not to use it when the game counts. There is a second account under the same name, shant_sargsyan, idle since April 2020; only the active one was used.

Haik Martirosyan, on micki-taryan, scores 64.1% with White and 73.3% with Black in 122 games. With White, after 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 d5, he scored 27.3% in 11 games, which the dossier flags as medium confidence — the only online line in the Armenian squad with a sample above ten. Robert Hovhannisyan, on robert_chessmood, scores 58.5% with White in 41 games and 47.5% with Black in 40, and opens 1.e4 in all 41 of his online White games.

Alexandra Kosteniuk has 39 games on the chessqueen account, with 64.3% as White and 44.4% as Black. The account lists no country, only the international flag; it was included because the Chess.com player page, which links the athlete to the account, points to it. Sofiia Hryzlova has 20 games with 25.0% as White and 40.0% as Black, and Camille de Seroux one. Twenty games are a small sample and one game is none.

Four opponents have a verified account and no games in the last 90 days: Gabriel Sargissian, Manuel Petrosyan, Mariia Manko and Ghazal Hakimifard. The account exists and is idle, which is different from the account not existing.

What to watch in round 7

The open-section question is not where Armenia are weak; the dossier finds few holes in five grandmasters who lose between 6 and 17 centipawns per move in the endgame. It is where they are least ambitious. Against 1.e4, four of them will most likely answer 1...e5, and the history says that game ends in a draw seven times out of ten. The alternative is to steer away from it with 1.d4 or 1.c4 and take on Sargissian's and Sargsyan's preparation, where the dossier has much less to offer. Against Petrosyan, the table overstates the danger; against Sargsyan, it does not.

In the women's section, the dossier offers two points with a real sample behind them. Manko's Catalan, with 42.1% in 19 games and a high-confidence flag, is the best-supported weak line in either match, and her Rossolimo as Black, 31.2% in 8, adds a second. Hryzlova's 1.c4 e5, 10.0% in 5, is a hint rather than a plan. Kosteniuk is the question mark: she drew from +7.12 today, but her profile has little else to exploit, and her games last longer than anyone's.

When the round starts and the official PGN brings the line-up, the dossier file attached to this article will show the four boards and each table's game, with no need for the text to change. Until then, what is here is the full squad. Two unbeaten teams, one match point ahead: the USA are favourites on paper, and the dossier explains why the paper has not been enough so far.

Frequently asked questions

Update log

• 2026-09-21 — First published, with the round 7 pairings checked on chess-results and the round still to be played: repertoire from 944 classical games broadcast on Lichess, error profile with Stockfish 19 at depth 16 and the blitz and rapid repertoire of the verified accounts. The dossiers cover both opponents' full squads; when the line-up comes out, the same file will show the four boards and the round's game.
• 2026-09-29 — The Olympiad ended on 27 September: Uzbekistan won the open and China the women's event. This coverage is no longer updated; the final result is in the standings story.

Sources

• 46th Chess Olympiad Samarkand 2026, Open — round 7 pairings — Chess-Results
• 46th Chess Olympiad Samarkand 2026, Women — round 7 pairings — Chess-Results
• Alexandra Kosteniuk v Marina Brunello, round 6 — broadcast game — Lichess
• Shant Sargsyan (sargsyan_shant) — titled profile that verifies the account used for the online repertoire — Chess.com

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