Magnus Carlsen was winning in three games and never in danger in the fourth as he beat Hikaru Nakamura 2.5:1.5 on Monday to level the score at 2 sets each in the Magnus Carlsen Chess Tour final. The World Champion is hard to please and summed up, “I haven’t found any semblance of rhythm whatsoever, so I’m in general very unhappy with the way that I’ve played”. The match has now become a best-of-3 decider for huge stakes, with the winner set to claim the $140,000 top prize.
After two sets in a row had gone to blitz tiebreaks, the 4th set was decided in rapid chess.
You can replay all the games using the selector below:
And here’s the day’s live commentary from Yasser Seirawan, Peter Leko and Tania Sachdev:
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Although there were no swings in results on Day 4 of the final, this game featured more of the high drama we’ve become accustomed to. Magnus repeated the English Opening that had almost seen him force Armageddon the day before, and once again he got a wonderful position out of the opening. 10.Qc1 surprised Hikaru, and 13.a4! seems to have been a powerful pawn sacrifice.
Hikaru declined with 13…d3, but after 14.a5 Nd5 15.Nc5 Bxc5 16.Qxc5 Kb8 17.Bd4 b6 we reached what Magnus called the “critical moment” of the game.
18.Qa3! immediately looks strong, but Magnus played what he called the “extremely poor move” 18.axb6!?, when after 18…cxb6 19.Qa3 dxe2 20.Rfe1 he was surprised by 20…Rc8! 21.Rxe2 Rc7! “and then he’s actually completely fine all of a sudden.”
You can watch Magnus talking about the day’s play below:
This was a day of very uneven play from Hikaru, however, and after 22.Rae1 he went astray immediately with 22…Bh3? allowing 23.Bxb6!
The neatest point is 23…axb6 24.Re7 Nxe7 25.Qa8#, while in the game after 23…Nxb6 24.Re7! Qxd2 25.Bxh3 Hikaru returned to playing with the same speed and resilience that have made him so formidable so far in the final. When later asked about why he’s struggled with time management, Magnus responded:
It’s because he’s playing well, I think! I feel like in all of these tournaments I’ve in general been burning a lot of time, but especially here he’s posing me a lot of problems and there have been several games here where I’m thinking I’m going to win and I’m just getting faced by new problems. It’s a really difficult balancing act, because it’s so easy to blunder if you just make a couple of quick moves.
The best chance to clinch the full point came after 31…g5.
32.Kh2! gxh4 33.Bg2! is winning for White, but Magnus said he’d missed that after 33…Qd7 he had 34.Rd3! “Obviously if you know there’s a way you find it in a split second, but that’s the way it goes,” he said. In the game after 32.hxg5 the advantage began to fizzle out, but it still needed some brilliance at the close for Hikaru to hold on with 42…Nf4!
After 43.Qxf4 Rg8+ 44.Kh2 Qxf1 there were no more twists and the game ended in a draw.
The first game wasn’t a win for Hikaru, but it felt that way, and then, as on the previous two days, the player who’d achieved that “win” with the black pieces then decided a quick draw with White was the way to go. Again it was the Berlin, though this time we got a rare, historical line!
The effect was the same, however.
Magnus had absolutely no complaints, since the first game of the day took some recovering from:
It wasn’t very pleasant, but I was very happy to just get a very quiet second game. I felt like if he wanted to kick me while I was down, that was the moment!
Magnus had a funny response when later confronted with a Nepo tweet that pointed out taking these quick draws with White has ended badly every time:
On the other days Hikaru had largely dictated play in the openings, but this time things kept going Magnus’ way. He tried the Giuoco Piano and by the time the players slowed down he was up a pawn. It may have been an ugly doubled pawn, but that mattered little as play switched to the other side of the board.
24.Nxg6! Qxd4 25.Ne7+ Kf8 26.Nxd5 was finely calculated by Magnus, though he expected 26…Rxe5! and, “I think it would just have been a fairly straightforward draw - I’m a pawn up, but it doesn’t matter”.
Instead 26…Qxf2+? appeared on the board, with Magnus commenting:
Qxf2+ was just a shock, because I just didn’t believe that it was possible, and then when he went Rd8 my first thought was I may have missed some kind of mate, but it turns out he’s lost, fortunately.
28.Rf1! was the winning move. 28…Bf5 would have been a fine defence if not for 29.Qa3+!, while in the game 28…Rxe5 29.Rxf2 Rdxd5 ran into the only winning move 30.Rxf7+!
Spanish Grandmaster Pepe Cuenca takes us through a spectacular game:
That meant that Hikaru now needed to win on demand in the final game, but it turned out Magnus had saved up a surprise just for such a moment.
Instead of the 6…Bd7 in Game 2, Magnus played a novelty in this particular position, 6…Bg7!?, which had the great virtue of making Hikaru burn up the majority of his time on the next three moves.
It was certainly a good idea to have in hand, I can tell you that. Obviously for him to face this unprepared was quite unpleasant, so it just worked out perfectly.
The key moment came as early as move 12.
12…c5! 13.dxc5 d5! and Magnus was comfortably better with Black in a game he only needed to draw. Our commentators, who at this point included Anish Giri, assumed it was home preparation, but Magnus denied that:
I can reveal as much as that c5 was not part of my preparation. It’s just that it’s a move that as soon as you see it, you know it’s right! I felt after c5 that the game was basically over, so that was obviously a very pleasant feeling. He has no development and it’s clear that he needs to play for equality, which he can’t do in view of the match situation, so the opening was just a disaster for him.
It became just a question of whether we’d get a draw or a win for Black, a question that got a sudden answer:
Magnus could just take on b5 and be a clear passed pawn up, but why do that when you have a stylish way to force the draw you need! He went for the “little combination” 34…Re1+! 35.Rxe1 Bd4 when White is forced to give perpetual check with 36.Re8+ Kg8 37.Re7+ Kg8 and so on. The watching Anish Giri enjoyed it:
So the match is now tied at 2:2, and what began as best-of-7 has become something we’re more familiar with – best-of-3.
No-one has yet managed to win two sets in a row, and Magnus feels he’s still not firing on all cylinders:
I haven’t found any semblance of rhythm whatsoever, so I’m in general very unhappy with the way that I’ve played. Today was a lot better, in the sense that he didn’t get any counterchances, so today was an improvement. Still there’s a lot to work on but at least I’ll take that with me that today wasn’t so much about survival...
The tension is only going to grow, but Magnus didn’t agree with Hikaru that there’s more pressure on him as the favourite (and the player who the Tour is named after):
I don’t know. I feel like whenever I play a tournament I should have a very good chance to win it. Obviously I love these tournaments, I love the format and everything, it’s just that it doesn’t add that much extra. There’s enough to begin with.
We're now down to a thrilling 3 sets match, and the last time that happened between these players it was Hikaru Nakamura who won the 3rd set in Armageddon to triumph in the semi-finals of the Lindores Abbey Rapid Challenge! We're delighted that the Lindores Abbey Preservation Society has contributed to our Kiva campaign for the Finals.
That's not all, as 2-time French Champion and Magnus Carlsen second Laurent Fressinet will be releasing a chess24 video series with highlights of the event. As a taster, here's his intro:
Hello dear viewers, I am French GM Laurent Fressinet and I am welcoming you to the video series about the second edition of the Lindores Abbey Rapid Challenge, which was part of the Magnus Carlsen Chess Tour. The young and talented Russian Grandmaster Daniil Dubov surprisingly prevailed in that exciting tournament. In this video series I am selecting and analysing the most memorable and instructive moments of the tournament. These great champions have shown interesting openings ideas, tactical brilliancies, strategic masterpieces and excellent endgame technique. Hope you will enjoy the series and thanks for watching!
There are no rest days, so tune in every day from 15:30 CEST each day here on chess24.
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