Bilbao Final Masters, Round 5: Two Solid Draws
Despite its short duration and the presence of mostly very young players, the Bilbao Final Masters has been characterized by a large number of very solid games; there have been only two decisive games out of the 10 played thus far. Oddly, both of today's games, Anish Giri vs. Ding Liren and Viswanathan Anand vs. Wesley So, reached rook and pawn endgames where Black had an extra pawn but his kingside structure was poor, with doubled f-pawns and an isolated h-pawn. In the Giri vs. Ding game all the pawns were on the kingside, so there was no reason not to agree to the draw on move 42, but things were livelier in Anand-So. Nevertheless, the former world champion defended well as the rook ending transmogrified into a pawn ending, then a queen ending, then another pawn ending and a final queen ending before being abandoned as a draw on move 58. If So had any real winning chances, maybe they would have come in the first queen ending.
In any case, So remains the co-leader, with Giri, with just one round to go. They each have seven points (three points for their one win, and one point apiece for their four draws), while Anand and Ding have four points each. Had the pairings been right a four-way tie for first would have been possible, but instead we have Ding vs. Anand and So vs. Giri for the last round tomorrow.
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