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Reports Mar 27, 2022 | 2:15 AMby Colin McGourty

Carlsen wins Charity Cup after Duda fightback

Magnus Carlsen made it two Meltwater Champions Chess Tour events, two victories, as he won the Charity Cup, but his overriding emotion was “huge relief” after withstanding a comeback by Jan-Krzysztof Duda. Magnus won a brilliant first game of the final day and was a move or two away from clinching the title with two games to spare, but one blunder and Duda stormed back to win two games in a row. Magnus was rocking, but he composed himself to win the blitz playoff 2:0 and take the trophy. Meanwhile over $150,000 was raised for Unicef’s work in and around Ukraine. 


You can replay all the games from the knockout stages of the Charity Cup, the 2nd stage of the $1.6 million Meltwater Champions Chess Tour, using the selector below. 

And here’s the final day’s commentary from David Howell, Jovanka Houska and Kaja Snare. 

And from Peter Leko and Daniel King. 

The Charity Cup has raised money to support UNICEF helping children in and around Ukraine — you can still DONATE HERE! 

The final day of the Charity Cup featured the first tiebreak in the 2022 Meltwater Champions Chess Tour. 


It was hard to imagine we would need tiebreaks after Magnus, who had won the first mini-match the day before, got off to the perfect start by winning with the black pieces. Up to move 12 we were following a game where David Navara had almost beaten Praggnanandhaa earlier in the Charity Cup. 

In that game, after 12…Be6 David had immediately played 13.f3, when the reply 13…Nxd2 was forced.

Duda, however, went for 13.Nb3!? and after 13…f5 14.f3 Magnus was able to play 14…f4 and after 15.Bc1 he offered to sacrifice the piece with 15…Rad8!

Duda wisely chose not to accept the sacrifice by playing 16.Qe2!, but after 16…Ng5!? 17.h4 Ne4 the threat of the knight coming to g3 meant it was time to bite the bullet with 18.fxe4. After 18…dxe4 White would still have been doing well after 19.Nc3, but Duda got into trouble with 19.Qxe4?

The immediate 19…f3! 20.Qxc6 f2+ is a win pointed out by the computer, but 19…Bd5 20.Qd3 f3! was also strong. 

A few moves later Magnus was winning, but 23…Rf3!? was a move that initially had Peter Leko wondering if it was a mouse-slip.

It was winning for the rook to go one square further, while it turns out 24.Nxf3! in this position was holding. Instead Duda played 24.Qxf3, which he later lamented. The Polish no. 1 called his play on Day 1 of the final “heartbreaking” and was incredibly critical of the choice he made at this moment on Day 2.

I basically thought it was match over, because I’ve made so many strange, bad and stupid decisions. You can lose of course to the World Champion, but not in such a fashion, and also I thought that if I didn’t take free material, a free rook, then something’s clearly wrong with me, so instead I preferred to give up the queen, only to give up the game later.

That was too harsh, however, since at a glance 24.Nxf3 Qh3 just seems to win for Black. However, it turns out 25.Bg3! Qxg3 26.Nbd2 is enough to hold. 

It also wasn’t so obvious that the move in the game lost, as after 24.Qxf3 Bxf3 25.Nxf3 Qh3 26.Nh2 there’s just one winning move. 


26…Bh6! brought in crucial reinforcements, and after 27.Re4 Rf8 28.Rae1 Magnus finally did play the move that was winning earlier, 28…Rxf2! Most impressive, however, was perhaps how after 29.Kxf2 Qxh2 30.Rg1 Qh3 31.Re2 he emphasised just how dominant Black was. 


31…a5! destabilised White’s knight, and soon Magnus had picked up so many pawns that there was nothing better than for Duda to resign. 

That left Duda needing to win two of the next three games, while Magnus could clinch the match if he won Game 2. That was how he approached the game.

I had a very decent mindset for Game 2. I thought I’m going to decide this now.

Duda played the Caro-Kann (1.e4 c6) and later commented, “somehow this Caro-Kann was probably my smartest choice of the Caro-Kann ever in my life”, though almost in the same sentence he admitted, “of course I got a disastrous position”. 

Magnus had complete control and nothing foretold the drama that would follow. 

Magnus, however, gradually lost his grip, while the move 28.Qb6? was a sign that not all was well with the World Champion.

Peter Leko seemed to spot 28…Qxb6 29.Bxb6 Nxc3!, taking advantage of the undefended bishop on e2, in milliseconds, but Duda didn’t, and in the nervy play that followed Magnus could have clinched the match.

Peter pointed out 34.f4! was very anti-positional, but it also wins immediately. After 34…Qf6 35.Qb8+! Kg7 36.Bd4 White wins the black queen and the game.

34.Bd4 retained an edge, but Magnus failed to appreciate that Duda had done some clever manoeuvring in time trouble, and 48.a6? allowed 48…Qa7! to turn the tables. 

Magnus raced through the stages of grief, and even managed a wry smile, but there was no way back in the game as Duda managed to hit back straight away. A knight is a knight.

When Magnus summed up how the day had gone, he commented:

This was right out of the playbook of what feels like every tournament last year after the first few ones. It seems like I’m cruising, and then there’s one bad moment and it all falls apart, but yeah, managed to survive.

Magnus still only needed a couple of draws to clinch overall victory, but Duda did everything in his power to topple Magnus, going for an offbeat opening in Game 3. 

He explained:

I decided to play something random with White in the next game and played this g3 stuff, and I was very surprised actually that Magnus played so ambitiously with Black, because being in his place I would just have played very slow, making short castles instead of long. I’ve played many similar games with Black in my life, mostly online chess, and it’s very, very challenging actually to play this kind of positions, because you are under attack and there are constantly some random tricks, and whatever you play with White I think is challenging for Black.

Duda sacrificed a pawn to blow open a path to the black king. 

It worked, and although Jan-Krzysztof was kicking himself for some of his moves, the tricks that he said he “luckily” had in the position had grown out of how he handled the game. He noted he’d been hesitating between whether to play 18.Nxe5! or 18.Ng5!, and it turns out both of them are very strong. He opted for the latter.

Magnus picked the best option for the next four moves — 18…fxg5! 19.Qg4+ Kb8 20.Nd7+! Rxd7! 21.Qxd7 Bxb4 22.Reb1, but in what was already a very tough position he stumbled with 22…a5 (22…Nd4! gives more hopes).

Duda was able to crash through with 23.Bxc6!, since 23…Qxc6 runs into 24.Qxc6 bxc6 25.Rxa5! and White has a winning endgame. 

A few moves later and Duda had taken the lead for the day.

Magnus, in a sense, could simply enjoy the fourth rapid game, since the worst had already happened. It made no difference if he drew or lost, since both those outcomes would mean a playoff, while if he won he would clinch victory.

Nevertheless, it was still hard work, and the small edge he was nursing against Duda’s Petroff vanished in a single move, when Duda realised he could play 18…Ne4! instead of retreating.

The point was shown in the game, with 19.Nxe4 dxe4 20.Rxe4 Nxc5! and the knight can’t be taken or the queen on d3 is lost. Duda hadn’t overlooked 21.Qc4+ since he had 21…Ne6.

To Carlsen’s credit he nevertheless managed to stabilise and build another small edge, but it was never quite enough, and in fact it was Duda who had a clear chance to win before Magnus took a last chance to force a draw. 

That meant the players had each won one mini-match and we were headed for playoffs. The momentum was with Duda, but he would later say, “when I thought I had a chance in blitz, I collapsed!” Magnus was glad the rapid was over.

I was relieved. My mind wasn’t working well at all during the last couple of games, so I was relieved to play slightly faster.

It was Carlsen’s turn to pick an offbeat opening with an early g3, and he went on to dominate, until history repeated itself. 

Obviously after that I couldn’t fully recover, and then the same happened in the blitz, that I was making little, little progress, and then I made one bad move thinking I’m winning a pawn by force, and I’d missed a trick and my advantage has just gone.

The mistake was 38.Bb5? Bxb5 39.Rxb5


Duda had almost no time, but he’d seen that 39…Kd7! in fact defends the pawn, since after 40.Rxd5+? Kc6! the rook is lost! 

The game looked destined to end in a draw, when Duda would have had the advantage of White in the second game. There would be another twist, however, with Magnus commenting:

I was very, very lucky there since I had given up, but then I thought, let’s just make a couple more moves and repeat the position another way. There’s a very, very slight chance he might take on g3 and blunder, so that was the kind of thing that can happen in blitz, and sometimes keeping the rally going one more shot can do the trick. Obviously when it comes down to blitz there are very small margins.


48…Bxg3? was a fateful rush of blood to Duda's head. After 49.fxg3 Rxe3 he’d be winning, but 49.Kd2! ruined that mechanism, and 49…Bc7 50.Rxd5+ Ke6 couldn’t save the day due to 51.Rc5! and Jan-Krzysztof resigned a move later. Neither player could quite believe it!

That meant Duda had to win the second blitz game on demand to force an Armageddon decider, and he did absolutely everything he could to generate chaos on the board. 14.Ng5!? was a very good try.

Magnus could sense how close the finish line was by now, however, and he dug deep to find the best reply, 14…h6! After 15.Nxe6 he was able to strike back with 15…Ndxe5!

It was Black who was able to organise an attack first, with the white position falling apart. The emotions at the end couldn’t have been more different.

It took Magnus five events to win a tournament on the 2021 Champions Chess Tour, but he’s now won both of the Meltwater Champions Chess Tour events this season.


The $25,000 for 1st place + $7,250 for the Prelims added $32,250 to his earnings, to leave him with more than double Duda in 2nd place. 


He wasn’t thrilled with his play, however. 

It’s hard to be very positive after a day on which I collapsed, but I think apart from today my play has been good, at least in the knockout, so I think it’s fine, but I still haven’t completely figured out how to turn the tide when things are going against me. But hey, at least I played better than him in the blitz, so there’s that!

“I managed to win some games and it was entertaining, at the very least,” said Duda, and you couldn’t argue, though you could perhaps argue that he was much too harsh on himself. He commented:

It’s been a very tiring day and it’s some miracle that actually I managed to win so many games today and the day was decided in blitz, because I feel as if I played terrible chess, so it’s kind of unexpected. 

Duda nevertheless took 2nd place, earning $15,000 as well as $5,750 for the Prelims, despite being a last-minute replacement for Radek Wojtaszek. 


The 2nd place earns Duda a place in the first Major of the tour.


The Major, that starts on April 20th, will be different, with 8 players who play 4-game matches against each other over 7 rounds. It’s hoped the players will also be together in Oslo, with Magnus looking forward to it after his experience with last year’s Tour Finals.

Yeah, that was massively enjoyable, so I can’t wait to get back to that, and hopefully I’ll be able to play everybody. Last time it was only Duda and Giri who were there, which was great, but to be able to play everybody in an eSports setting, that’s going to be exciting. 

That’s not far away, while the chess action doesn’t stop. The FIDE Grand Prix is approaching the knockouts (when Peter Svidler and Jan Gustafsson will be back to commentate), while the European Chess Championship starts on Sunday. 

See also:


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