52-year-old Vishy Anand heard Anish Giri’s tweet that he’d “retigered” once or twice two often on Wednesday, but Vishy’s killer instincts were in evidence as he maintained the tension just long enough to let Veselin Topalov lose their Round 2 Norway Chess game on time. That was the only classical win of the day and saw Vishy take the sole lead, while in Armageddon the biggest result was Wesley So defeating Magnus Carlsen to put himself in clear second place.
You can replay all the games from Norway Chess 2022 using the selector below.
And here’s the day’s live commentary from Jovanka Houska and Jan Gustafsson.
In Wednesday's Round 2 of Norway Chess it was only Vishy Anand who picked up a full 3 points for winning in classical chess.
The 73rd classical game of chess between Vishy Anand and Veselin Topalov would end in a 20th win for Vishy (compared to Veselin’s 13), but it wasn’t easy, with Vishy admitting afterwards that he felt, “a bit relieved — today was a topsy-turvy game!”
It was clear early on that we weren’t going to get a lifeless encounter.
Veselin said he didn’t expect the opening and had already spent 14 minutes by this point (move 6), but when Vishy pushed 14…c5!? he almost got more than he bargained for. Veselin grabbed the pawn and had his Indian opponent worried.
Vishy commented:
I didn’t see a defence to Rac1! "See a defence" is too strong, obviously I can keep playing a pawn down…
The point is that after 21.Rac1! Rxb3?! White has 22.Nd4! and wins back the piece with a very good position. Pretending that nothing had happened with 21…h6 is a better defence, while in the game Veselin instead went for 21.Nfd2!? and after 21…Qb4! the pattern of the remainder of the game was set.
Vishy aimed to set up a “clamp” on the white position, but his main hope was elsewhere.
I felt that as long as I didn’t get carried away he had to “pay” for his time management, and he should at least steer it to a draw with some difficulty. I felt that’s the maximum I can hope for.
Topalov later lamented:
I played so passively… He put all his pieces on better squares, and I had to fight for a draw, and eventually I even forgot that I don’t have to write down the moves, so I was spending all this time.
When Veselin’s clock dropped under five minutes he was allowed by the tournament regulations simply to make moves without writing them down on his scoresheet, but instead he kept taking that extra time — perilous, when there was no increment before move 40.
“In a sense he has already gone to the Armageddon game, while I’m still playing the classical one!” said Vishy, adding:
I kept on trying to keep the game going on just to see if he would stagger to move 40, and well, he didn’t! I don’t think I ever lost the plot or missed something, but I don’t think I’m better also. Even at the end it’s somehow not enough.
It didn’t matter, however, since Vishy had won the game.
He’d become the only player on a perfect 6/6 and could also boast of re-entering the Top 10 on the live rating list.
Anish Giri was right.
The tweet was brought up by Jan in the post-game interview, with Vishy responding:
It’s the second time I’m asked this today! I’m not really sure what to say. The first time you hear it, it’s a compliment, but now… I’m happy with my score and I can’t complain!
The only player within 1.5 points of Vishy is Wesley So.
The classical game in this clash was absolutely nothing to write home about. Magnus appeared in the confessional booth midway through to attack the opening choice — his coach Peter Heine Nielsen saw himself as the unnamed target!
Still, an effortless draw with the black pieces against a key rival is never the worst thing that can happen, especially as there was still a chance to win the mini-match in Armageddon.
Magnus had Black and only needed a draw, so that Wesley was surprised when Magnus didn’t go for a solid opening. In a sharp mainline Italian, Wesley chose the most challenging option himself with 5.Bg5, commenting, “You have to win at all costs, so it’ll be better if you’re worse than equal!”
It was a tense fight, but on move 24 Magnus made a similar mistake to the one he’d made against Wesley in the opening blitz tournament.
Back then the knight retreat 22.Nd1? saw Magnus go from slightly worse to dead lost. This time 24…Nd8?, which Wesley called “too cautious”, saw him go from significantly better to roughly equal after 25.Ra5.
Magnus still only needed a draw, however, and when he recalled he could still castle on move 34 (!) his position was decent. It all fell apart, however, on move 42.
It was time to play a difficult endgame with 42…Qxf4! 43.gxf4 g3!, or to try and hold things together with 42…f6!, since after 42…Qc5 43.e5! Wesley was suddenly crushing on the kingside with a key defender cut out of the picture (it was very similar to the way 57.e5! saw Wesley beat Ian Nepomniachtchi in Bucharest).
Wesley crashed through and was midway picking up all Magnus’ pawns with check when the World Champion resigned.
That continued Wesley’s great start in Stavanger, with Veselin Topalov among those regretting that the US Champion didn’t qualify for the Candidates Tournament.
As Wesley revealed in the post-game interview, however, he will play the Olympiad for the US team. He gave the line-up (it won’t necessarily be in this order).
The most notable absence is that of Hikaru Nakamura, who of course does play the Candidates.
The post-game interview with Maxime also gave us more Olympiad info, as the French no. 2 confirmed that both himself and Alireza Firouzja would be skipping the event in Chennai, where France could have been one of the big favourites (especially in Russia’s absence, and with Wesley So saying he’d heard rumours that China won’t field a team). He commented:
In general it was a tough decision, but both Alireza and I thought we need a rest. And I was kind of aware of the climatic situation in summer, where I feel I could get sick and be almost certain I wouldn’t be performing to the best of my abilities, so it’s sad, but I will be missing my first Olympiad since 06, if we don’t count the online Olympiad.
The Olympiad takes place in the rainy season in Chennai, though Vishy noted after his own game, “it’s even warmer than Thailand, Jan — I’m sorry!”
Maxime’s Round 2 clash with Shakhriyar Mamedyarov began with an unremarkable classical game that was followed by a much more entertaining Armageddon. Maxime admitted he’d blundered rather than sacrificed a pawn and Shakh seemed to have everything under control, but the specifics of Armageddon weighed on Shakh.
With White you know how to play, just play for a win, but with Black you need to stay safe, you win a pawn, but normally you need to attack, to mate him because you have an extra pawn, but now with an extra pawn you think a draw is also good.
He regretted exchanging queens, but it was only 21…Nc4? (e.g. 21…b4! and Black is still better) that saw things fall apart.
22.Nd5! (only possible as the knight left b6) was suddenly threatening a fork on c7, and though Shakh could get out of that he couldn’t save the b5-pawn, which dropped with 22…Rd8 23.Nc7 Nxe3 24.fxe3 Rb8 25.Nxb5.
It was still a fight, but now World Blitz Champion Maxime Vachier-Lagrave had the wind in his sails and went on to score a smooth victory.
The classical game Maxime wished he was playing was the Najdorf Sicilian we saw in Giri-Wang Hao.
Partly it was just that he loves the Najdorf, but also he’d played the exact same line as Giri.
Here Yu Yangyi played 19.Nxe7+, while Wang Hao picked 19.axb4, but the moves led to the same place, the position after 22.Qxd6.
In this position MVL played 22…Ree8 and got into some trouble, but Giri quickly went for the stronger, and much more dramatic, 22…Rxc3! 23.Bxe5 Ba2+ 24.Kc1 Rxc2+ 25.Kxc2 Rxe5 26.Bc4 and here Wang Hao’s plan of testing whether his opponent knew theory looked to be working perfectly as Anish Giri sank into a 45-minute think. Anish picked correctly, however!
He explained afterwards:
I actually recalled Rc5, I was just trying to understand why Rc5, because sometimes you recall the move, you make it, and then you lose immediately!
Was it the longest time he’d spent on a move?
The longest time I ever spent for a good move! Usually after such a long thought you come up with a bad one, but here I sort of remembered.
The best summary of the game, and of many of the opening battles we see in modern chess, was the following:
The level of excitement is directly disproportionate to the level of knowledge you have about opening theory!
That meant Armageddon, and for the first time in 7 games it was Black, in this case Anish Giri, who emerged victorious, after Wang Hao missed one fleeting chance.
37.Rd5! wins the d6-pawn, since 37…Bxd5? 38.exd5 forks the queen and knight. Wang would have had decent chances to get the win he needed, but instead after 37.Rf6 he soon slipped into a lost position before Anish forced the draw he needed for an Armageddon win.
The classical game between these two saw queens exchanged on move 8 and was described as one for connoisseurs by none other than Vishy Anand.
Aryan took 22 minutes before playing the 17…a5!, 16…a4 manoeuvre but revealed afterwards that he was just trying to recall his notes… and felt he succeeded!
The Armageddon was instead full of swashbuckling action and could have gone either way, with Aryan pointing to the moment after Radjabov’s 25.Be5?
25…Bxh3! would have given Black a huge advantage (26.Bxg7? Qg4! and Black crashes through), but after 25…g6? Teimour was on top.
Aryan put it down to chess blindness that he didn’t consider capturing on h3 — "I usually know how the bishop moves!"
The game ended in a frantic time scramble where Aryan was happy to make move 40 but less happy to realise that when he got there he was getting mated!
That leaves the standings as follows after two rounds, with Vishy Anand out in front.
In Round 3 Wang Hao (with a 3:1 lifetime record against Anand!) stands in the way of Vishy scoring a 3rd win in a row, while Magnus Carlsen will likely be gunning for a first classical win in this year's Norway Chess when he takes on Teimour Radjabov. His lifetime record is 9:2 in wins against the Azerbaijan star.
Don’t miss the Norway Chess commentary from Jan Gustafsson and Jovanka Houska from 17:00 CEST each day!
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