Norway Chess, Round 2: Mamedyarov Leads
Every pairing has a winner, but there are 2-0 winners and 1.5-0.5 winners. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov was one of the former, thanks to consecutive blunders by Viswanathan Anand in their classical game, and as a result he leads after two rounds of Norway Chess with 3.5/4.
Levon Aronian nearly joined him, as he enjoyed a winning advantage against Magnus Carlsen for a very long time, but let a clear win slip on move 54 (54.g5!) and the rest of the advantage drop on move 58 (58.Re4+! followed by 59.g5 kept hope alive). Carlsen is not someone to give a second chance to, and he won the Armageddon game convincingly.
Carlsen is in second with 3/4, tied with Yu Yangyi. Yu drew the classical game with his countryman, Ding Liren, and won the Armageddon game.
Fabiano Caruana bounced back from yesterday's Armageddon loss by defeating Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the classical game. After winning the blitz and taking the #1 spot on the blitz list, MVL has landed with a thud in this tournament, tied with Anand for dead last with .5/4.
Finally, Alexander Grischuk went for a known draw by repetition against Wesley So, finishing their classical game in just 15 moves. His optimism about his chances against So in blitz was misplaced: So was winning from early on, settling for a draw - which counts as a win in the Armageddon format - in a position that was still comfortably winning.
Here are the round 3 pairings:
Reader Comments (1)
Results after round three put Yu ahead of Fabi. Excluding the Armageddon games Fabi has 1.5 and Yu has 1. So is this a classical event or not? I think the experiment with the scoring system is backfiring, or maybe it isn't. Maybe it was put in place to ensure a Magnus victory seeing as he just doesn't lose playoffs.
Being the greatest chess player ever to walk the face of the planet helps too!