Anish Giri and Levon Aronian were the star names who lost out on a frantic last day of the Airthings Masters Prelims, with Levon losing in 20 moves to Andrey Esipenko in the final round while Anish was unable to beat Magnus Carlsen on demand. Ian Nepomniachtchi finished top, with Magnus taking clear second, while underdogs Eric Hansen and Vincent Keymer kept their nerve to reach the playoffs. It’s Nepo-Keymer, Hansen-Esipenko, Artemiev-Ding Liren and Le-Carlsen in Wednesday’s quarterfinals.
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov's Round 13 win over Anish Giri left the Dutchman with a mountain to climb
Replay all the games from the preliminary stage of the Airthings Masters, the 1st event on the $1.6 million 2022 Meltwater Champions Chess Tour, using the selector below.
And here’s the day’s live commentary from Tania Sachdev and Peter Leko…
…and from Kaja Snare, Jovanka Houska and David Howell.
Here are the final standings of the Prelims, with the Top 8 qualifying for the knockout.
Going into the final day of the Airthings Masters Prelims there was just one player certain of reaching the quarterfinals, Ian Nepomniachtchi, while another 13 players were engaged in a battle for the remaining seven spots. There were just three rounds to be played, but with three points for a win anything could still happen.
Many of the players were in a situation where a single win would either guarantee, or almost guarantee them, a place in the quarterfinals. One was 23-year-old Vladislav Artemiev, who secured his spot with a smooth win over Hans Niemann with the black pieces.
It was a similar situation for Magnus Carlsen and Anish Giri, but neither could grab a crucial win. Magnus played a risky opening against Levon Aronian and then took over with the tricky intermediate move 20…Nf3!
After 21.gxf3 exf3! 22.Nxd7 fxe2 23.Bxd8 Kxd8 Magnus had won a pawn and he soon had the kind of position you expect him to convert in his sleep. It didn't happen, however, as the game fizzled out into a draw in 58 moves, when only bare kings were left on the board. It was another sign that the World Champion wasn’t quite firing on all cylinders.
It was much worse for Anish, whose chances were hit hard by a loss to Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, who was playing for pride, and money, since his own qualification chances were only mathematical. Anish commented:
Going into today I thought that actually my situation is not so good. Three draws was maybe ok, but I wanted to win one of the games, to be sure, and somehow I didn’t play well against Shakhriyar and I lost that one. I think I was doing very well there, I was definitely not thinking I was running a risk at all, but somewhere in time trouble I made a blunder.
Anish fought on valiantly, but the remainder of the game had a largely aesthetic appeal — for instance, this position.
Instead of taking the new queen it remained on the board for five more moves, with play continuing 62…Bf2+ 63.Ke2 Ba7+ 54.Kd1, and still Anish gave checks rather than taking the monarch. There was no real hope of salvation, however, and Giri resigned on move 79.
A draw against Vincent Keymer hit Praggnanandhaa’s already slim chances of making the knockout, but the sensation of the round was Eric Hansen comprehensively outplaying the leader, Ian Nepomniachtchi. By the end of the game he was a full four pawns up.
Eric would later comment:
The good thing is I started off with a very nice game against Nepo. I converted a good position, which I’ve struggled with this tournament. And that made things a lot easier, because coming into today three draws might not be enough, even with +2, but a win and a draw, something with four points would probably be good enough, and getting the three off the bat, it gave me a lot of confidence!
Eric continued that sentence we just quoted:
But then as you saw, it went straight down because Alexandra crushed me, and I had a feeling that was going to happen, because she had a pretty unlucky run. sSe’s a strong player and capable of beating quite a few players in this field.
Alexandra Kosteniuk had suffered a nightmare event, losing all 13 of her previous games, but she never stopped playing fighting chess, and finally it paid off.
Here she correctly went for the pawn grab 15.Qxb7! and largely dominated the play that followed until 34…Nxf2? allowed her to end the game on the spot.
35.Qxb8+! and Eric resigned, since 35…Nxb8 36.Rd8# is checkmate.
That was worth three points and $750, but the relief was priceless.
Liem Quang Le’s win over Vincent Keymer, combined with his defeating Alexandra in the previous round, meant he was suddenly right where he needed to be, but the main qualification news of Round 14 was that Magnus Carlsen sealed his spot.
A tense battle against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov suddenly swung in the World Champion’s favour after 30…Re6?
Magnus pounced with 31.e5! You can’t capture that pawn as the c5-knight would be hanging. While 31…Qe7 would have been a good defence if Shakh had played 30…Rd7! on the previous move, here it ran into 32.Nd4! and the rook was caught on e6. Magnus took it and went on to win fast, securing his quarterfinal spot.
The standings were insanely close going into the final round, with nerves visible everywhere. Aronian-Esipenko looked to favour Levon for qualification, not just because he had the white pieces but since in the previous round Levon had beaten Nodirbek Abdusattorov while Esipenko lost to Jan-Krzysztof Duda.
In the end form meant nothing, however, since it all turned on one moment.
20.Qf5! is a tricky draw according to the computer, while 20.Bd2! also saves the day. Instead Levon played 20.Bc1?, which had a huge drawback. 20…d3! forced resignation.
The major difference in the bishop going one more square is that it cuts the a1-rook off from defending the e1-rook. With the bishop on d2 Levon could play 21.Qxd3 and Black taking on f2 with the queen is just a single check. With the bishop on c1 the e1-rook would fall.
It should be noted, however, that 21…Bxf2+ is a whole lot trickier!
That win ensured Esipenko’s qualification, while Ding Liren crept over the line by beating Kosteniuk. For others, draws would do the job, with Liem Quang Le clinching a place with a draw against Hans Niemann, while Hansen 1/2-1/2 Keymer proved enough for both players to make the quarterfinals.
Vincent felt his Julius Baer Challengers Chess Tour experience the previous year had helped him stay calm and exceed his own expectations.
[My qualification] is something I’m not sure that anyone really expected, at least I didn’t. I’m really happy. Of course everyone who plays this tournament somehow has this goal of reaching the Top 8 and qualifying, but I didn’t really consider it to be very realistic.
The most-anticipated game of the final round, however, was Giri-Carlsen, where Anish was all but certain he had to play for a win on demand. Magnus was already through to the knockout and could prevent a key rival from joining him.
The game saw Giri play the Anti-Marshall — a gutsy move considering Carlsen had prepared it in huge depth for the World Championship match against Ian Nepomniachtchi. Anish has never been afraid of going for theoretical discussions, however, and although at some point he seemed to lose the thread he then regained the initiative and had any chances at the end.
Suddenly, however, it was over, drawn by repetition.
That surprised Magnus:
I think the opening he chose was normal, but I’m surprised he didn’t play on at the end. I thought he was making a little bit of progress, and frankly I’d played pretty terribly over the last 15 moves or so, so that was a bit grim, but that’s really up to him to explain rather than me.
Magnus summed up his play:
I think I played pretty badly today, so I’ll have to play a lot better in the knockouts, but at least I'm there, which is the most important.
He’s also not bothered about the new, accelerated one-day matches for the quarterfinals and semi-finals.
Frankly I’ve generally done well on Day 1 of the quarterfinals and then struggled a bit on Day 2, so I guess it’s not bad for me.
Anish had adapted to the three-points-for-a-win system and reflected:
Sometimes when you’ve got this mindset of fighting chess, you also tend to lose more, but I have to try and find the right balance, keep the wins coming but not lose so many games. I think I never lost in qualification so many, like five games.
In fact he only lost four, the same number as Magnus, and there’s another silver lining to being knocked out — rest before the Belgrade FIDE Grand Prix.
Another player who missed out on the quarterfinals was 16-year-old Praggnanandhaa, but he beat the World Champion in some style, and finished on a high, taking down Vladislav Artemiev, who could have finished in sole second place with a win.
Pragg had beaten four of the quarterfinalists, with the quarterfinal pairings as follows.
It’s going to be a huge challenge for the underdogs in the top half of the bracket, though Keymer-Nepomniachtchi and Esipenko-Hansen finished drawn in the Prelims, while Artemiev-Ding is perhaps the most balanced quarterfinal. Liem Quang Le, who lost to Magnus in the Prelims, admitted qualifying was something of a poisoned chalice!
The numbers back up the intuitive impression.
There’s no break for the players, and on Wednesday the semi-finalists must already be decided. We’ll have a 4-game rapid match, and only if the scores are tied do we get two blitz games and then, potentially, Armageddon. Don’t miss the Airthings Masters Knockout, right here on chess24!
See also:
We respect your privacy and data protection guidelines. Some components of our site require cookies or local storage that handles personal information.
Using chess24 requires the storage of some personal data, as set out below. You can find additional information in our Cookie Policy, Privacy Policy, Disclaimer and Terms of Website Use. Please note that your data settings can be changed at any time by clicking on the Data Settings link in the footer at the bottom of our website.
Comments 7
Be the first to comment!