Greetings faithful readers! I just had an awful performance in the Titled Tuesday tournament on chess.com so I thought: hey, why not write a blog about the first half of the Candidates? This (somewhat belated) blog will recap the first four rounds (out of only seven as the tournament has been postponed). Hope you like it.
Before we begin here is the full list of players with my predictions before and after the postponement:
FABIANO CARUANA
Heading in to the tournament as the first seed coming off of a spectacular and record tying 10/13 at the Tata Steel tournament (which included four consecutive wins in the last four rounds and pushed his rating up to the astounding 2842), Caruana was undoubtedly the favorite (and in my eyes still has a good chance when the tournament resumes if he can start winning).
DING LIREN
Ding started the tournament as the second seed with a rating of 2805. Despite a few months of inactivity, Ding was still considered to be Fabi’s main rival. As things turned out, he was completely knocked out of contention, and when the tournament is resumed I give him close to 0 chances of turning it around and winning.
ALEXANDER GRISCHUK
Prior to this tournament Grischuk had sneaked up to world number 4 at 2777. He certainly had (and has) some chances, but his time pressure is a plague he will never be cured of, and I think that alone makes him unlikely to win, in my eyes.
IAN NEPOMNIACHTCHI
Nepo was right behind Grischuk, world number 5 at 2774. I think Nepo has good chances to win this tournament due to his dynamic style and fearlessness in going for the win. He certainly demonstrated in the first half that he is capable, despite this being his first candidates tournament. His main problem is moving too quickly. As we’ll see in my next post, he made a critical mistake in an almost winning position against Ding due to quick play. If he can cure himself of this problem in the respite he will be a force to be reckoned with.
MAXIME VACHIER-LAGRAVE
MVL was the last minute replacement for Radjabov. Despite having little over a week to prepare, MVL has done extremely well and has just as good a chance to win the tournament as anyone, despite this being his first Candidates. MVL was (and still is) also in the world top ten, with a rating of 2767.
ANISH GIRI
Giri is most certainly a very strong player (as I learned the other day when I played him in blitz!), at 2763, but I feel that his play is a bit too solid to win. You need to win many games to win a tournament of this level, and I’m not sure Giri has it in him.
WANG HAO
Wang Hao was the incredibly surprising winner of the 2019 FIDE chess.com Grand Swiss, finishing ahead of world champion Carlsen and tied with Caruana (but ahead on tiebreaks), which qualified him for the Candidates and shot his rating up to 2762. He had quite an impressive first half (tied for the lead), but I don’t think he is a favorite to win the tournament. Despite his strong play, not only has he fallen behind the leaders, but he just doesn’t have the experience necessary to win top level tournaments such as this one.
KIRILL ALEKSEENKO
Alekseenko is the wild card. His performance has been nothing special, and justifies his under 2700 rating. I don’t see him finishing in the top half of the field, but he could play the role of spoiler in the last half.
With that, let’s move on to the action!
ROUND 1
This round was replete with interesting games. First, Nepomniachtchi beat Giri in a brilliant technical performance from the Russian. Also, Wang Hao scored a big upset against Ding Liren, who was clearly off form and may have been affected by a two week quarantine prior to the event. Finally, Grischuk missed a big chance in time pressure (of course) against the wildcard Alekseenko, and Caruana applies some pressure but it wasn’t quite enough to win against MVL.
Sorry if some of those long variations were overwhelming! No more of that from here on out.
ROUND 2
To start with, Caruana won a brilliant game against Alekseenko out of a sharp 4. f3 Nimzo. But the highlight of the round (in my view) was MVL’s strong win against Ding in a Ruy Lopez. As you will see below, one move was enough to basically decide the struggle. As for the rest of the games, Wang was very close to winning against Giri. He won a pawn but later on allowed some counterplay, and soon after a repetition of moves ensued. And finally, the Nepo-Grischuk game was not extremely interesting. Grischuk was in time pressure as usual and missed some chances to press before heading for a dead drawn opposite color bishop ending.
ROUND 3
This round the real story was Ding summoning all of his strength and beating Caruana after the American sacrificed two pawns but failed to find the right moves after his prep. The compensation dried up and Ding went on to win smoothly. As for the other games, Alekseenko-Nepo was an interesting draw out of a French, with Alekseenko missing a chance to win on 26 while in time pressure. After that Nepo had sufficient compensation for the exchange and the game was drawn in short order. Finally, Wang Hao saved a worse position against Grischuk, as did MVL against Giri.
ROUND 4
All in all this was a pretty dull round, with all draws. The only interesting game was MVL-Grischuk. Out of a dry Berlin, the game looked to be heading towards an early draw, but Grischuk complicated matters in severe time pressure. MVL missed a win (as he was playing against his opponent’s time pressure, a cardinal sin at this level in my opinion), and after that the game was indeed uninteresting. In other news, Caruana got some advantage against Nepo but let it slip in to a slight disadvantage before holding the draw. Ding-Giri was not very interesting, as Giri played well and didn’t allow Ding a hint of an advantage. And finally, Alekseenko just barely managed to save the draw against Wang Hao, after allowing unnecessary complications.
That’s all for now. Thanks for reading and stay tuned for the next part, coming next week!
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