Magnus Carlsen was furious with himself for missing a win against Liem Quang Le but conceded, “clearly the highlight of the Preliminaries is Liem’s performance and play,” as his opponent went on to finish top. A thrilling climax saw Vidit, Praggnanandhaa and Richard Rapport just miss out on the quarterfinals as Hans Niemann and David Navara made it through. It’s Le-Navara, Carlsen-Niemann, Anton-Duda and Ding-Van Foreest in Wednesday’s quartefinalfinals.
The moment Magnus Carlsen realised he'd let his chance to win the Preliminaries slip against Liem Quang Le
You can replay all the games from the Prelims of the Charity Cup, the 2nd event on the $1.6 million 2022 Meltwater Champions Chess Tour, using the selector below.
And here’s the day’s live commentary from Peter Leko and Daniel King.
And from David Howell, Jovanka Houska and Kaja Snare.
The Charity Cup Prelims went right down to the wire, with Richard Rapport, Praggnanandhaa and Vidit ultimately just missing out on qualifying for the knockout.
The pairings for Wednesday’s quarterfinals are as follows.
Let’s take a look at how the final three rounds went.
Liem Quang Le had been the pacesetter all the way through the Preliminaries, but his first loss, to Ding Liren in Round 12, meant that Magnus Carlsen went into their game knowing that a win would see him take over in 1st place on the tiebreak of their head-to-head encounter. Both players were already qualified for the quarterfinals, but that didn’t stop Magnus going for a classic grind, and for 83 moves he’d done everything right.
Here, however, 83…Rxd5? threw away the win, since after 84.Bxf7 Rd4 85.Kf3! there was no way to shield the remaining black pawn to victory. 85…Rg4 86.Be6! Rxg5 87.Kf4 followed and the game was soon drawn. Instead 83…Ke4! and Magnus would have won. The World Champion was visibly furious at what he’d done.
Both players won in Round 14 and drew in Round 15, so that Liem Quang Le finished top of the table. Magnus had no complaints, summing up his performance as follows:
I think I didn’t play so well, but overall the performance is quite good and I just think Liem was stronger this time in the Preliminaries, so I think I should be reasonably satisfied with the score and then we’ll see who I play.
What makes Liem so strong?
I think he has a style that’s suited pretty well for rapid chess. He’s solid, very, very sound and has a pretty good technique as well, so I think that works well and that’s why he’s doing well now. He’s always been very good at faster time controls as well as of course being a very decent 2700 player in classical.
Magnus was happy with some of his games, but conceded:
Clearly the highlight of the Preliminaries is Liem’s performance and play.
The highlight of Round 13, however, was a remarkable move by David Navara. The Czech no. 1 had been on the ropes against Gawain Jones, but the Englishman’s 26.Rxh7? overlooked an amazing resource.
Black hadn’t yet castled, so that 26…0-0! completely turned the tables. Nothing works for White, though 27.Bxg6 only accelerated the end, forcing the powerful 27…Qxe5! and after 28.Re2 Navara had 28…Be4! opening the b8-rook’s path to b2 with tempo. 29.Qxe4 Qxb2+ 30.Kd1 Qc1# was a fittingly brutal end to a great struggle.
David lost to Liem Quang Le in the next game but will get a chance for revenge, since he faces the Vietnamese star in the quarterfinals after defeating Ju Wenjun in the last round to scrape through in 8th place. He commented afterwards:
I was lucky in quite some games, but on the other hand I missed quite some opportunities as well. I hope that the spectators liked my games, because there were many mistakes, but many things happening, except for maybe one game.
One of the most impressive results of the round, and one that had a huge impact on the fortunes of both players, was David Anton defeating Richard Rapport in a powerful game that turned on a few tactical details.
Round 13 also saw wins for two players who knew they had to win on demand to have any chance of the quarterfinals, Harikrishna and Eric Hansen. They both managed it, with Hari impressively outplaying Jan-Krzysztof Duda, while Eric took down Vidit in striking style.
After 34.Kg1 either knight would come to e2, forking the king and queen. 34.hxg3 and after 34…hxg3 there’s no good defence against the black queen coming to h4 and delivering checkmate.
The hopes of Harikrishna and Hansen were extinguished in the next round, however, with Hari getting outplayed by Hans Niemann. Eric, meanwhile, was doing everything right against Jan-Krzysztof Duda and had a position that was almost impossible to lose… Alas, 53.Qc5?? was the one way to do it, and after 53…Rc7! Eric couldn’t believe his eyes, since there isn't a single safe square for his queen.
He commented:
I had a very small chance heading into today to catch up on the leaderboard. I had to win every single game, but Round 13 I played one of my better games against Vidit, and so I started feeling a little confident heading into Game 14, that there was a chance, and I played a really good game against Duda as well. And then I found a way to trap my queen. Going over it, it’s very hard to get your queen trapped like that, and I managed to find a way. It’s really heartbreaking, but I don’t really think I played well enough throughout the four days to give myself a good chance to qualify. I don’t think I really deserved it.
Eric made a winning move off the board, however, donating all of the $4,000 he earned to the UNICEF appeal to support children and their families in and around Ukraine.
Jan-Krzysztof Duda’s unlikely win there all but sealed his qualification. The finishing touches were taken with a quick draw in the final round that saw both himself and his opponent Ding Liren make it though.
Richard Rapport spoilt a winning position against Gawain Jones but was also lucky to hold on and draw, while the other game of the round was Praggnanandhaa’s swashbuckling win over the in-form Jorden van Foreest. It was full of stylish, well-calculated moves such as 25.Rxa7!
It also featured a nice finish.
31.Rxg5+! and 31…Kxg5 would run into 32.Ne4+, but after 31…Kh4 there was still no way of avoiding that fate: 32.Qd4+! Kxg5 33.Ne4+
It put 16-year-old Praggnanandhaa on the verge of the quarterfinals, but the final round would be cruel on the Indian stars.
Going into the round the standings looked as follows:
Of the three players who were outside the Top 8 and needed to win, David Navara had the best chance, and he did indeed go on to win a convincing game with the black pieces against Ju Wenjun.
The other two were up against it. Richard Rapport had Black against Liem Quang Le, and though he did extremely well to generate chances in a position that looked unlosable for White, it wasn’t quite enough.
Vidit had the white pieces, but he was up against World Champion Magnus Carlsen. Nevertheless, he managed to apply huge pressure and manoeuvred until Magnus made concessions and his position was hanging by a thread.
The computer in fact suggests here that giving up the c6-knight immediately with 55…Qf3 or 55…Qc2 may give enough compensation for the piece, after capturing on f2 next.
Magnus thought for over four minutes, however, and opted for the sadder piece sacrifice with 55…f6?! 56.exf6 Qf5 57.Qxf5 gxf5 58.Bxc6, when Vidit emerged up a piece for a mere pawn. Magnus put up huge resistance, however, and Vidit’s failure to take another pawn when he had the chance saw the game fizzle out into a draw. It was a repeat of the situation Magnus had found himself in against Liem at the start of the day, but the heartbreak was even greater.
Praggnanandhaa, meanwhile, started the round in a qualifying spot and needed only a draw against David Anton. Instead, for much of the game, he was winning, but then it all began to fall apart.
32…Red7!, 32…e4 or 32…Bb5 are all strong, winning moves according to the computer, but 32…g5?! was loose, and after 33.Ne3 Kg7? the f5-pawn soon became a huge weakness, with David rerouting his bishop from d5, to a2, to b1 to attack it. There were chances to hold in what followed, but David Anton went on to grind out an 83-move win.
“Everything could happen, but I think I finally was a bit lucky and I won the game”, said the Spanish star, who had reached the knockout stages of a Champions Chess Tour event for the first time after a number of near misses.
It was tough on Praggnanandhaa and Richard Rapport, who had both shown themselves to be worthy of a place in the knockouts and only missed out in the end on Sonneborn-Berger tiebreaks despite scoring the same 21 points, worth $5,250, as David Navara.
The Season Bonus Pot is also growing. If a player wins a game in the Prelims they get $750, but if it’s a draw both players get $250 and the extra $250 goes into that pot. We’re now up to $40,000, double the $20,000 starting prize, but there are still four Regular tournaments to go.
There’s no break before the quarterfinals, which will once again be played as a one-day four-game rapid match. If the players are still level they’ll play two blitz games and then, if needed, Armageddon.
Hans Niemann’s “punishment” for losing Rook vs. Rook + Bishop against Jorden van Foreest in the final round is that he finished 7th and faces 2nd-placed Magnus Carlsen. Hans described his day as “never-ending torture” but is looking forward to playing the World Champion.
Obviously the opportunity to play him in a match will be great. I think that 8-year-old me would be very proud to be reaching this point in my career, so I’m just glad to enjoy the match and do my best.
What does it mean to him?
It means a lot. One year ago I was a Harvard reject with no potential life, and I think a year ago I was 2520, I was barely a grandmaster, I had just got rejected from my dream school, you could say, so one year ago things were looking pretty bleak. But at this moment to play Magnus in a match and make it to the Top 8 is definitely a dream come true. So obviously I’ll just cherish the moments, because the fact that I’m even a professional chess player now is a complete miracle. It would have been so easy for me to be a professional streamer or go to college, but the fact that I’ve been given this opportunity to be a professional chess player I’m very grateful for and will make the most of.
The winner of Carlsen-Niemann will play the winner of Ding Liren-Van Foreest in the semi-finals, while it’s Le-Navara and Anton-Duda in the other half of the bracket.
Don’t miss Wednesdays quarterfinals of the Meltwater Champions Chess Tour Charity Cup, live from 17:45 CET right here on chess24!
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