Candidates, Round 4: Draw, Draw, Draw, Draw
Four draws, but not bad ones. All made it past move 40, and in a couple of the games there were missed opportunities, albeit generally brief ones.
The biggest chance was Maxime Vachier-Lagrave's. He obtained nothing with White against Alexander Grischuk in the Berlin ending--or rather, he obtained nothing from the opening and nothing on the board. What he did secure for himself was an enormous advantage on the clock - Grischuk's gonna Grischuk, as the kids say - and instead of keeping the position safe and solid the Russian made the position sharp and anything but safe. For several moves in a row, Black would have been fine, had he played ...Be6, but when he rejected it on move 28 and especially on 29, he gave MVL a great opportunity. Instead of moving his bishop to a3 on move 30 (who does he think he is, Mikhail Botvinnik?), 30.Re4! would have won (or at least given him a huge advantage).
Fabiano Caruana also had some chances, though nothing anywhere near as clear-cut as MVL's opportunity. He obtained an edge against Ian Nepomniachtchi's Gruenfeld, and although Nepo was fine his task wasn't an easy one. I'm sure Caruana saw the right move, 31.Qd4, but perhaps didn't see anything concrete as he analyzed it further. That may be so - maybe Black is still objectively fine there, if he can defend forever with computer-like precision - but his position is unpleasant. Just as importantly, Black was absolutely fine after 31.Qf3? Qe1+ 32.Kg2 f5, when Black's queen will find her way to e4 and the game will be instantly equal.
The other two games were less dramatic. Wang Hao enjoyed a persistent plus against Kirill Alekseenko, but was unable to make anything of it, while Anish Giri didn't have much difficulty neutralizing Ding Liren's slight edge in a Catalan.
Here are the games, and here's what's on tap for tomorrow:
- Giri (1.5) - Caruana (2)
- Grischuk (2) - Ding Liren (1.5)
- Alekseenko (1.5) - Vachier-Lagrave (2.5)
- Nepomniachtchi (2.5) - Wang Hao (2.5)
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