Let's catch up on some other news, and take note of some interesting matters from around the web.
1. Carlsen wins the FTX Crypto Cup
Old news, but for those who didn't follow the event, it's worth going back and browsing the games. After the preliminaries of this rapid event the quarterfinal pairings, in bracket order, were as follows:
It would have been interesting to have a world championship match preview, but it didn't happen. In fact, both players were nearly eliminated in the quarters. They both split each day's mini-matches, and the two-game blitz tiebreakers were both drawn as well. It came down to a pair of Armageddon games, with both Carlsen and Nepo needing to win with White. And they did. The other matches were won more smoothly by their victors. So won both mini-matches against Vachier-Lagrave, while Radjabov won the first day's match against Giri and drew the second to advance.
In the semis no tiebreaks were required. Carlsen and Radjabov drew the first day's match, with Carlsen winning game three and Radjabov saving the day with a win in game 4; on day two, however, Carlsen won games 1 and 4 without a defeat to advance. Nepomniachtchi failed to join Carlsen in the final, however. So won one game on day 1 to win that match, and won game three on day 2 to clinch at least a draw in the second day's match, guaranteeing match victory and ending the contest.
The Carlsen-So final was epic, as the kids say. Carlsen won the first game with Black, but So equalized the first day's match with a win in the third game and saved the day. On day 2 Carlsen again struck first, winning the first game, and again So got revenge, this time in game 2, and once again the match finished in a tie. It was on to the blitz tiebreaker, and this time So won first - with Black, no less. Big problem? Maybe, but not too big a problem. Carlsen got his revenge, and then won the Armageddon game with White to win the match and the tournament. There was also a battle for third place, and Nepo won it, drawing the first day's mini-match against Radjabov before winning the second one.
2. World Chess Championship 2022
In November, as alluded to in the previous entry, Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi will have their world championship match. It was supposed to happen last year, of course (assuming Nepo had managed to win the Candidates last year, had it been played straight through without the one-year break after the first cycle), with another cycle culminating in a world championship match in 2022. One might think that the year's delay would push that back as well, but no: FIDE is going to have a world championship match in 2022 after all. One other note - one I at least wholeheartedly approve of: Teimour Radjabov will get a direct spot in that event. More here.
3. 10 Positions Chess Engines (Allegedly) Just Don't Understand
While some of the positions mentioned in this article still display relative blind spots for engines, quite a few of these positions are perfectly well "understood" by engines. One example is the Topalov-Shirov game in section three, where Stockfish on my mediocre computer recognizes 47...Bh3 as the winning move, and the only winning move, after less than seven seconds. Or to take another hoary old example, the Arshak Petrosian-Laszlo Hazai game is another fairy tale. White's 46.Nxb6+ is often given one or two question marks, but if you play around with the position you'll see that the standard story of how White could have won is a myth. Or back to section 3, where the computer has no trouble seeing Spassky's 50.c5. Or in the game Brzozka-Bronstein, it doesn't take too long for the comp to find 48...Rxb3+. So while the article should be taken with a horse-sized salt lick, there's still some entertainment value to be had.
4. Endgame Studies for and by Jan Timman
Have a look here. The last study given by Timman, at the end of the article, is really extraordinary. I would also add - and will say more about this soon - that Harold van der Heijden's study database (he is the director of the contest, a fine composer in his own right, and the compiler of the premier endgame study database) is a terrific value, very much worth buying for anyone interested in endgame studies for either aesthetic value or as a training tool. More info here.