Carlsen's Candidates Predictions

Caruana and Ding are his picks.

(Originally posted yesterday, here. Please subscribe at my Substack blog, where my posts will be published first.)

No shock there: the conventional wisdom is conventional wisdom for a reason. It’s not surprising that Magnus Carlsen agrees with the betting favorites, Fabiano Caruana and Ding Liren. There are some (mild) surprises in his assessments of the rest of the field. He places Alireza Firouzja and Ian Nepomniachtchi in the “dark horse” category; players who are underdogs but with a real chance of winning the tournament.

The other four, he gives little-to-no chance. He thinks Richard Rapport has a very slight chance, while he thinks Hikaru Nakamura “will probably have a decent event”, but not decent enough for a “real chance”. And Jan-Krzysztof Duda and Teimour Radjabov? No shot.

First, Second, Third, Fourth: Snapshots from the 2022 Norway Chess Tournament

Magnus Carlsen once again showed why he is and has been the World’s #1 player for over a decade, and the World Champion for nine years. While the race for first in the recently completed Norway Chess tournament was closely contested, it was Carlsen who kept his nerve when it mattered most, while Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (second), Viswanathan Anand (third), and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (fourth) all had their lapses when it mattered most. It’s not that Carlsen’s play was perfect by any means; rather, he made more of his opportunities than his opponents did with theirs, especially in the critical moments.

We begin with the Anand-Carlsen “match” in round 5. First, a little explanation is in order. The scoring system in the tournament was unusual. The players would contest a classical game with 3-1-0 scoring (three points for a win, one point for a draw, and no points for a loss), with a further twist. In case of a draw there would be an Armageddon blitz game, with the players keeping the same colors, with a further half point going to the winner (or to Black in case of a draw). Anand played very well against Carlsen in their classical game, and was on the way to a well-deserved win…until he let it slip. Carlsen held the draw and forced an Armageddon game, which Anand, to his credit, managed to win. Nevertheless, that cost Anand a point and a half - and two and a half points relative to Carlsen. That result alone would have been enough for Anand to win the tournament, had everything else remained the same.

Next up, round 6. Carlsen was pressing for a long time against Mamedyarov, who defended well and kept the game within the bounds of a draw. It wasn’t an easy defense, but he was doing a fine job…until a mental lapse on move 46. Mamedyarov blundered a critical pawn to an elementary tactic, after which Carlsen converted his advantage to a victory with little difficulty.

In round 8, two more critical results followed. Anand was still doing well, but with White in the classical game against Mamedyarov made an absolute howler of a blunder, and resigned without waiting to see Mamedyarov make the winning move. It was a nice tactic, and one that could be overlooked by mere mortals at any time. It’s not even that hard to see a great player missing the trick in a blitz game. But it is surprising to see one of the all-time greats, and a legend when it comes to chess calculation, miss it in a classical game. Errare humanum est!

Meanwhile, Carlsen was suffering against Vachier-Lagrave somewhat analogously to the way Mamedyarov suffered against him in the earlier game. He too had a momentary lapse…but MVL failed to take advantage of it, and they went to Armageddon. In this game too Vachier-Lagrave had the advantage, but content with a draw (he had Black, and in Armageddon a draw is as good as a win for the second player) he chose a very impractical way to force it. The game could have been saved, but without enough time to think he failed to do so, losing another half a point. Had MVL won the classical game and everything else remained the same, he would have come in clear first rather than fourth.

The margins in top-level chess can be razor-thin. My hope for the coming Candidates tournament - starting tomorrow! - is that the player who wins, wins convincingly. It’s not that I don’t want to see a competitive event - I do. But for the sake of the sanity of the runner(s)-up, I hope that he or they won’t be torturing themselves for the rest of their lives with the question, “What if I had only found that one move?”

To see the games mentioned above, and a discussion of the critical moments therein, click here.

Chessable Masters: Giri Leads After 12 of 15 Rounds in the Prelims

A reminder: the preliminary section of the Chessable Masters, as with all the Meltwater Tour events, is only important in a pass/fail sense: a player needs to be in the top eight to qualify for the knockout stage. So while it's terrific for Anish Giri to lead with an impressive, undefeated 9/12, half a point ahead of Ding Liren (also undefeated) and Magnus Carlsen, none of the points will carry over to the knockout.

Tomorrow, they'll play the last three games of the preliminaries, and several players currently on the outside looking in have a shot at making it into the top eight. Here are the full standings:

1. Giri 9 (of 12)
2-3. Ding, Carlsen 8.5
4-5. Mamedyarov, Wei Yi 7.5
6. Anton 7
7. Praggnanandhaa 6.5
8. Harikrishna 6
9. Tari 6 (but critically, behind on the tiebreaks)
10-11. Vidit, Grandelius 5.5
12. Shankland 4.5
13. Hansen 4
14-15. Mishra, Van Foreest 3.5
16. Jones 3

A game that caught my eye - and probably everyone else's - was Carlsen's round 12 game with Wei Yi, featuring 1.h4. The jokey first move aside, it was a rich game, full of content, and both sides can be proud of their play at certain moments in the game. Here it is.

Day 1 of the Chessable Masters: Wei Yi the Early Leader in the Prelims

As mentioned in the preceding post, two super-GM rapid events got underway today (Thursday), and this is the second one: the Chessable Masters, part of the Meltwater Champions Chess Tour. It follows the usual MCC format: a 16-player round robin preliminary that cuts the field in half, followed by a series of knockout matches.

As you'd expect, most of the field is very strong, consisting of 2800s, 2700s, and former 2700s. At the top, the world's #1 and #2 players, Magnus Carlsen and Ding Liren, are participating; and in the 2700s there's Anish Giri, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Wei Yi, Santosh Vidit, Sam Shankland, Jorden Van Foreest, and Pentala Harikrishna. Everyone else is in the 2600s, except for the world's youngest-ever GM, Abhimanyu Mishra. Normally, one would expect him to be the whipping boy, but after losses to David Anton and Ding Liren (though he was beating Ding) he bounced back with wins against Eric Hansen (the second-lowest seed) and Mamedyarov. Could he qualify for the knockout stage?

The current leader is Wei Yi, who drew with Praggnanandhaa in round 1 before defeating Harikrishna, Gawain Jones, and Anton. He is half a point ahead of the murderer's row of Ding, Giri, and Carlsen, all of whom are undefeated.

I'll show one game, the round 3 battle between Nils Grandelius and the world champ. The Alapin/2.c3 Sicilian/Sveshnikov is generally solid and a little dull, and can be a safe way for the lower-rated player to pull the plug against a higher-rated opponent and head for something drawish if nothing interesting happens in the opening. (To be fair, Grandelius also played the Alapin in round 1 against Giri, so it doesn't seem that he was trolling Carlsen for a draw.) In this case, however, it royally backfired, and he was completely lost right out of the opening. Shockingly, Carlsen failed to take full advantage, though he did go on to win. Alas, this won't put an end to the Alapin, but it's still nice to see it get punished. (And it did throughout the day: in five Alapins White managed a total of two draws in five games.) Here's the game.

Oslo Esports Cup 2022

The Oslo Esports Cup is the opening event for the 2022 Meltwater Champions Tour, and as you'd expect from last year's Tour it's a very strong tournament. Magnus Carlsen leads the parade of stars, which also includes top-name players like Jan-Krzysztof Duda, Anish Giri, and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov. It's an eight player round robin, with each round a best-of-four game match with a 15'+10" time control.

Round 1 was on Friday, with these results: 

• Carlsen 2.5 - Duda .5
• Giri 2.5 - Eric Hansen 1.5
• Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu (P.R.) 2.5 - Jorden Van Foreest .5
• Mamedyarov 2.5 - Le Quang Liem 1.5 

Many of these results were turned upside down in round 2, on Saturday: 

• Le 2.5 - Carlsen 1.5
• P.R. 2.5 - Mamedyarov .5
• Van Foreest 2.5 - Hansen 1.5
• Duda 4 - Giri 2 

Everyone is 1-1 except for Hansen, who lost twice, and Praggnanandhaa, who has not only won twice but crushed his opponents.

Tournament site here; games here.

Ukraine Defeats Norway in Friendly, Fundraising Match (Updated)

Ukraine won this Scheveningen-format match over Norway by a huge margin, 11-5, but the main purpose of the match was to show solidarity for Ukraine and to raise funds for various charitable organizations (more here). The Ukrainian side Vasyl Ivanchuk, Kirill Shevchenko, Yuriy Kuzubov, and Alexander Moiseenko; the Norwegian team consisted of Magnus Carlsen, Aryan Tari, Johan-Sebastian Christiansen, and Lars Oskar Hauge.

The games were played with a rapid time limit of 10'+10" - it had to be a fast time control, at least in part because Carlsen played four games in another rapid event today (with a 15'+10" control). He struggled on the day - in both events, as it turned out - defeating Ivanchuk in the prestige matchup and then Moiseenko in the next round before losing to Kuzubov and Shevchenko.

Video coverage of the event is here, and all the games (with comments to Carlsen-Shevchenko) are here.

**The update was the revised game file, with Carlsen-Shevchenko annotated.**

Wijk aan Zee, Round 13 (Final Round): Carlsen Still Wins

A little joke in the title, alluding to Magnus Carlsen's having already won the event with a round to spare. He duly collected his free point by showing up, resulting from Daniil Dubov's positive COVID-19 test a few days ago. That guaranteed that he would win the event by at least a full point, and as neither of his closest pursuers - Richard Rapport and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov - were interested in outdoing the other, their very quick draws left Carlsen the winner by a point and a half. Rapport drew with Anish Giri in 14 moves, while Mamedyarov split the point with Fabiano Caruana in 13 moves.

Those three games featured no drama and only 27 moves in total, but the other four games were interesting and hard-fought, with three of them finishing with a winner. Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa won on the white side of a Saemisch Nimzo-Indian, thanks to Andrey Esipenko's big mistake on move 27.

Sergey Karjakin played an extremely unambitious line of the Scotch Four Knights against Vidit Gujrathi, but when Vidit started making problems for himself Karjakin was happy to take advantage and reel in the full point.

Jorden Van Foreest didn't succeed in repeating as the tournament winner, but for one of the bottom seeds to finish with +1 it was still an excellent result. He won a long, grinding game against Sam Shankland, who was still within range of a draw until his 53rd move.

Finally, Nils Grandelius and Jan-Krzysztof Duda drew a wild game after a somewhat bizarre opening. First Grandelius had a big advantage, but went for a mistaken tactical idea. Grandelius probably missed Duda's 24...f6!!, but Duda needed to find one more great move to win. He played 26...bxc3, which allowed Grandelius to make a draw. Instead, 26...Qb7!! was correct, putting an end to White's counterattacking prospects and taking over the initiative. White keeps his extra piece, but with three pawns and domination in the center, Black would enjoy a winning advantage.

So that's it for the first super-tournament of the year. Carlsen got the year off to a good start, adding three points to his rating to reach 2868. Mamedyarov gained nine points to get to #5 in the world. For Caruana, by contrast, it was a disappointing event. He's still #4 in the world, but he lost 10 points and finished with only an even score.

Another notable aspect of the tournament was Dubov's getting COVID. There was concern that he might get it, having been in "close contact" with someone who had contracted the virus, and so the organizers requested that he wear a mask. He refused, and had to forfeit a game. He was then cleared to play, but several days later did in fact come down with COVID. With the FIDE Grand Prix starting in a few days, what happens if Rapport, who played in Wijk and is playing the Grand Prix, caught the virus from Dubov and is forced to forfeit one or more games there? Hopefully the scenario won't arise, but organizers need to decide what they are going to do about situations like this in the future. (Readers, your thoughts? Please focus your comments on situations like Dubov's rather than a more general policy about vaccines, masks, St. Fauci/evil Fauci, etc.)

Let's wrap this up. The last round games, with my notes, are here, and the final standings follow. (An asterisk notes that the player obtained a forfeit win over Dubov.) I should add that Arjun Erigaisi won the Challengers event with an impressive score of 10.5/13. He cooled off over the last few rounds, though he did win in the last round. He finished two points ahead of his closest pursuers, finished with a TPR of 2804 (better than all but the top three of the main event), and qualified for next year's main event.

• 1. Carlsen 9.5* (of 13, but really 8.5/12 plus the forfeit win)
• 2. Mamedyarov 8
• 3. Rapport 8*
• 4. Giri 7.5*
• 5-6. Karjakin, Van Foreest 7
• 7-8. Esipenko, Caruana 6.5
• 9-10. Duda, Vidit 6
• 11. Shankland 5.5
• 12. Praggnanandhaa 5.5*
• 13. Grandelius 4.5
• 14. Dubov 3.5 (nine played games)

Wijk aan Zee, Rounds 9-12: Carlsen Clinches Clear First With a Round to Go (and an Assist from Dubov)

Magnus Carlsen is remarkable - as if we didn't all already know that. He hasn't been in fantastic form, and failed to win several winnable games (which is something he rarely does). And still, despite all of that, he leads the 2022 edition of Wijk aan Zee (Tata Steel) by a full point with a round to go, has added points to his lofty rating, and thanks to Daniil Dubov's getting COVID-19 (or at least testing positive for it), Carlsen has a free point in the last round, guaranteeing tournament victory.

Early on Vidit Gujrathi led the event, and when we left off last time he was within half a point of Carlsen and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, tied for third with Anish Giri. Unfortunately for the talented Indian player, he was unable to keep up his early pace. He drew with Richard Rapport, and then lost - with White - to his countryman Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa. "Pragg" is the lowest-rated player in the field and was in next to last place, but it didn't matter: he outplayed Vidit in a complicated middlegame and ground him down in the ending. In round 11, Vidit was losing a rook and pawn ending to Carlsen, but the champ couldn't figure out the right idea and he (Vidit) escaped. Finally, round 12 was another heartbreak with White, as what could have been a beautiful attacking win against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov resulted in a loss.

Giri had a great run, winning four in a row from rounds 6-9 (well, three wins and a forfeit point in round 7 when Dubov refused to wear a mask after being in close contact with someone who came down with COVID). In round 10 he had White against Jan-Krzysztof Duda but failed to get any advantage, and the game was drawn, but as Carlsen also drew that round he remained just half a point behind. It was only in round 11 that Giri's hopes of winning the event came to an end - and as in 2021, though under different circumstances, it was again his countryman Jorden Van Foreest who played spoiler. Van Foreest was in the middle of the pack, but played a great attacking game that even impressed Carlsen, crushing Giri on the white side of a Saemisch Nimzo-Indian. A win in round 12 against cellar-dweller Nils Grandelius would have put him into a tie for second, but after achieving a serious opening advantage a couple of errors left him fortunate that Grandelius accepted his draw offer.

Mamedyarov was tied for first with Carlsen when we left off, and they were paired in round 9. It didn't go well for the Azeri, who was crushed in 27 moves. Short draws with Sam Shankland and Sergey Karjakin followed, but with his win against Vidit in round 12 (mentioned above) he remained a point behind Carlsen, tied for second with Rapport.

Speaking of Rapport, he has had a good run over the past four rounds. He had Vidit under pressure through much of round 9, though the game finished in a draw, and then he beat Fabiano Caruana with Black in round 10. Dubov was a free point in round 11 (COVID), and at that point he was within half a point of Carlsen. In round 12 he probably took too many liberties against Andrey Esipenko, and was close to losing. Fortunately for him, Esipenko missed his chance, and the game finished in a draw.

Still, Esipenko is one of only five players with a plus score, so kudos to the youngster. He drew with Jan-Krzysztof Duda in round 9 (with some help), beat Van Foreest in round 10, and drew with Grandelius (with a little help) before being the help-er in round 12 against Rapport.

Caruana has not had a good tournament. He was on 50% after eight rounds, and he's still on 50% now after four decisive games, all won by Black. He beat Grandelius, lost to Rapport, won against Praggnanandhaa (a game he felt good about), and then lost in round 12 to Carlsen. Other players with a 50% score are Karjakin, Van Foreest, and Vidit.

Having talked about the challengers and pretenders, let's get back to the World Champion and tournament leader. As already mentioned, he defeated Mamedyarov in round 9 and Caruana in round 12, and both wins were convincing. Round 10 was a sort of half-point bye, as Karjakin played with no ambition whatsoever and allowed Carlsen to repeat (with Black) using a line that many others have played for that same purpose. As also noted above, he was very close to defeating Vidit in round 11. It's a slight pity that he didn't win that game (and still defeat Caruana), as there would then be no issue about what might have been, had he played Dubov in the last round. Anyway, congrats to Carlsen, who has clinched tournament victory. He is the best player in the world, though Alireza Firouzja and perhaps Ding Liren will have something to say about that in the next year or two.

Here are the games from rounds 9-12, with my comments, and here are the last round pairings:

• Van Foreest (6) - Shankland (5.5)
• Grandelius (4) - Duda (5.5)
• Rapport (7.5) - Giri (7)
• Praggnanandhaa (4.5) - Esipenko (6.5)
• Carlsen (8.5) - Dubov (3.5) [But not really - it's already 1-0]
• Mamedyarov (7.5) - Caruana (6)
• Karjakin (6) - Vidit (6)

Wijk aan Zee, Round 7: Carlsen the Solo Leader, Dubov Forfeits to Giri

Today's round was eventful for both chess and non-chess reasons. First, the latter. The story is probably continuing to develop, but here (HT: Allen Becker) is the initial report. In brief, Daniil Dubov was in "close contact" with someone infected with COVID, but when he was given the quick test the results were negative. Despite that, he didn't show up for his game with Anish Giri, possibly because he was required to wear a mask but didn't want to - something he had told the organizers even before the event that he wouldn't do. Giri came to the board, wearing a mask of his own, played 1.d4, and won by forfeit. If the story has developed beyond this point, please let me know.

Now to the chess. Magnus Carlsen is now the sole leader of the tournament. Entering the round he was tied with Vidit Gujrathi and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov for the lead. He won fairly comfortably against R. Praggnanandhaa, while Mamedyarov drew a spectacular game with Richard Rapport and Vidit lost to Jorden Van Foreest. Carlsen is thus in clear first with 5/7, half a point ahead of Mamedyarov and a point ahead of Vidit, Rapport, Giri, and also Andrey Esipenko. Esipenko drew with Sam Shankland, and wasn't far from a win that would have put him into a tie for second.

A further half a point behind, at 50%, there's Van Foreest (the defending champion), along with Fabiano Caruana (who won a shaky game against Jan-Krzysztof Duda) and Sergey Karjakin (who may have missed a win against Nils Grandelius).

Duda and Shankland are on -1, Dubov and Praggnanandhaa are at -2, and Grandelius is alone in the cellar with a -3 score.

The games, with my comments, are here, and these are the pairings for round 8, tomorrow:

• Shankland (3) - Carlsen (5)
• Mamedyarov (4.5) - Praggnanandhaa (2.5)
• Karjakin (3.5) - Rapport (4)
• Vidit (4) - Grandelius (2)
• Caruana (3.5) - Van Foreest (3.5)
• Dubov (2.5) - Duda (3)
• Esipenko (4) - Giri (4)

Wijk aan Zee, Round 5 & 6: A Three-Way Tie for First, Including Carlsen

The tournament has continued to be competitive and generally aggressive, with 16 decisive games so far out of 42, with plenty of other games seeing players miss significant chances for the full point. It has also tightened at the top, and Vidit Gujrathi is no longer the sole leader, though he continues to enjoy a share of the lead.

In round 5 he was caught by Richard Rapport and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, who won against Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa and Jorden Van Foreest, respectively. Rapport mishandled the opening against Pragg, but in the sharp middlegame that ensued his opponent lost the thread and was soon lost (though the game went on for a long time). As for Mamedyarov, JVF got too optimistic, and his 21.Nf7 seemed to be a blunder - he probably just missed 21...Rxf7 or, perhaps more likely, missed 24...Nxf5. Whatever the case, he was lost, but Shakh gave him a chance to escape. 35.Qb7+ would have drawn, but 35.Rc1? allowed Black to coordinate everything for a final attack, and Black won.

As for Vidit, he was fortunate to draw with Anish Giri in round 5, and in round 6 he achieved a more normal draw with Jan-Krzysztof Duda. Mamedyarov remained tied for first after his short but shaky draw with Nils Grandelius, but the third member of the triumvirate changed. Magnus Carlsen defeated Rapport to take his place in shared first. Rapport was within a move or two of solving his problems on the black side of a Catalan, but didn't manage to find the best moves at the key moments. (20...Ne5 probably would have resulted in a quick draw, for instance.)

There were two other decisive results. One saw Fabiano Caruana lose a horrible game to Giri. The weirdness started with the baffling 18.Kh1 and concluded with the unbelievable 40.Rb6. Sometimes, one's brain goes on strike, and when that happens all you can do is shrug it off and hope it feels like returning to work the next day. Speaking of going on strike, your blogger has decided to give himself a pass when it comes to examining games in the Giuoco Piano. So (almost) all I can tell you about Sergey Karjakin's game with JVF was that it was a Giuoco and that he won it.

All the other games from these two rounds have more robust comments from yours truly, and you can replay them here. And here are the pairings for round 7, today (Saturday):

• Esipenko (3.5) - Shankland (2.5)
• Giri (3) - Dubov (2.5)
• Duda (3) - Caruana (2.5)
• Van Foreest (2.5) - Vidit (4)
• Grandelius (1.5) - Karjakin (3)
• Rapport (3.5) - Mamedyarov (4)
• Praggnanandhaa (2.5) - Carlsen (4)