The FIDE Grand Swiss is getting exciting! Just when Alireza Firouzja was on the verge of guaranteeing himself a spot in next year's Candidates tournament, he had the misfortune of facing the tournament's top seed with the black pieces. For Fabiano Caruana, it was a must win situation, and win he did. He played great chess in the opening through the early ending, but a mistake on move 23 let Firouzja get back into the game. It still wasn't easy for Black to hold, and when he mistakenly went for active counterplay with 35...Kd3 and 36...Ke2, Caruana got a second chance to win. This time he converted, and caught up with Firouzja in first.
A three-way tie for first, because David Howell won a good game against Anton Korobov. Through most of the event Howell had been at least a couple of score groups behind the leaders, but after his loss to Caruana in round 5 he has reeled off four wins in a row (against Nodirbek Yakubboev, Ruslan Ponomariov, Andrey Esipenko, and now Korobov). Remarkable.
Of course, the three leaders have the best shot at the two qualifying spots for the Candidates, but they have little security when it comes to the rest of the field, as ten players are just half a point behind: Krishnan Sasikiran, Yu Yangyi, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alexandr Predke, Alexei Shirov (still hanging in there!), Grigoriy Oparin, David Anton Guijarro, Gabriel Sargissian, Sam Sevian, and Nikita Vitiugov.
Here are the pairings for the penultimate round:
1. Firouzja (6.5) - Howell (6.5)
2. Vachier-Lagrave (6) - Caruana (6.5) (Not exactly a day off for Caruana!)
3. Vitiugov (6) - Oparin (6)
4. Shirov (6) - Yu (6)
5. Predke (6) - Anton Guijarro (6)
6. Sevian (6) - Sargissian (6)
7. Esipenko (5.5) - Sasikiran (6)
I've annotated a selection of games from round 9: some for their importance at the top of the standings, some because of the tactics therein, and one - Gelfand-Movsesian - for being spectacular from start to finish. Have a look.