Magnus Carlsen goes into the 1st rest day of Norway Chess as the co-leader after beating Anish Giri to make his lifetime score against his Dutch rival 6 wins to 1. Wesley So is the only player to have won all four mini-matches, after surviving a lost position to defeat Vishy Anand in Armageddon, but Vishy, with two wins in classical chess, is a point clear of Wesley. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov picked up the only other classical win, beating Wang Hao to move up to 4th place.
Magnus Carlsen is aiming to win a 4th Norway Chess in a row | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
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And here’s the day’s live commentary from Jan Gustafsson and Jovanka Houska.
In Round 4 of Norway Chess Magnus Carlsen and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov picked up a full 3 points for winning in classical chess, while Wesley So, Teimour Radjabov and Veselin Topalov got 1.5 points for a win in Armageddon.
Carlsen-Giri, one of the chess world's most anticipated clashes | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
16-year-old Anish Giri beat Magnus Carlsen in 22 moves in their first ever classical game back in Wijk aan Zee in 2011, and for the next five years Anish could boast of a plus score against the world’s best player. That ended when Magnus finally picked up a win in Bilbao in 2016, and since then the World Champion has taken over, now increasing his classical score to 6:1 in wins, with 22 draws.
Giri’s chess superpower has been the opening, but after the game he explained that it gradually dawned on him that he’d gone astray early on, playing 11…Be6 instead of his intended Qb6 and Rd8 first.
I know this variation extremely well but I confused the order and it’s a pity, because I could have figured it out.
The curiosity was that the same “mistake” had been made by Magnus Carlsen himself, in a game he won after Praggnanandhaa overpressed. Only 13.Bxf6 by Magnus varied from Pragg’s play.
It felt as though Anish was much too focused on what went wrong in the opening, however, since the position he got was by no means irretrievable.
It was only here that 16…Qxa1?, giving up a queen for two rooks, left Magnus completely in the driver’s seat. Anish said he was “choosing between two evils” and felt that in the game he might get chances to build a fortress, but he’d also missed the best option: 16…Qa3! 17.Rad1 Na5! and Black's position seems to hold together.
Magnus had no reason to facepalm | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
In terms of pure chess counting — a queen is worth 9 pawns, a rook 5 — it seemed as though the trade of a queen for two rooks should be a good deal, but in this case it’s not clear if Black could have held even with perfect play.
As it was Magnus got a dream position where his bishop and queen pinned down the black knight and one rook, and the free rook was powerless to help.
There were multiple ways to win, with Magnus initiating three plans — pushing the e-pawn, capturing the black queenside pawns, and pushing the white a-pawn — before Anish decided it was time to resign.
That win would see Magnus, the winner of the last three Norway Chess tournaments, become co-leader going into the first rest day.
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov picked up the day's other classical win | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
The only other player to win in classical chess was Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, though it had seemed at first as though his game against Wang Hao might be the first to end, since 10.Bc2 Bg4 11.Bb3 looked to be an invitation to draw by repeating moves.
Here Shakh instead played 11…Nc5!, later explaining:
It looks like a new move I played, after Bb3. It’s very funny! Normally, of course, I agree a draw, but I remember I played it with one of my seconds, we have a 200 difference in Elo, he played Bb3 and a draw against me. And finally I checked myself, and I found the 11…Nc5 move to play for a win, and I played it against him and I won. It’s a very good line: 11…Nc5 12.Bxd5 Nxe5 13.Bxa8 Qxa8 14.Nbd2 0-0 15.h3 Bh5 16.g4 Nxg4 17.hxg4 Bxg4 18.Re1 Bd6 and after this for the engine again it’s a drawn position. I don’t know how it’s a draw, but without the rook it’s more interesting to play! No rook, but very good attacks.
This is the position Shakh was talking about:
11…Nc5 wasn’t a complete shock to Wang Hao, but he commented, “I analysed something, but during the game I forgot to check it… I simply blundered something very badly”.
Instead of taking the rook, Wang Hao went for 13.Bf4!? and after 13…c6 Shakh was very happy with his position — “two bishops and easy to play!”
The game was perhaps finally decided after 28…Bd2.
Wang Hao gave up the exchange with 29.Nxa4?! Bxe1 30.Nc5 and Mamedyarov went on to win smoothly.
Instead after the obvious 29.Red1! Mamedyarov showed the nice line 29…Bxc3 30.Bxc3 Nxc3 31.Rd2 (31.Rd3 is an alternative) 31…Rxc5!? 32.bxc5 Rc8! and described it as an “easily winning position”, though Wang Hao might have had more chances than in the game.
So-Anand was a clash of the leaders | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
This clash was critical for the tournament lead and, despite some expectations of a quick draw, it was a thriller. The English Opening led to a highly double-edged position, but one which, despite 12.c5 being a new move, it turned out wasn’t quite outside the realm of known theory.
Vishy struggled to recall it at the board.
It’s some old preparation of mine. Basically, I checked it recently, but I’m afraid much too fast, because when I was trying to remember what I’m supposed to do it was a bit of a blur. Luckily, I managed to somehow land on my feet. I reconstructed most of it, but it’s nicer just to remember your prep! This was prep done five years ago, so only some fragments were staying in.
After 13…Nh6 14.e4! Vishy’s 14…dxe4 diverged from the computer’s top line of 14…Rd8, and got Wesley thinking before he replied 15.Nxe4. Wesley also visited the confessional.
The curiosity here was that in his confessional appearance Wesley talked about 15…Bd7 as Vishy’s "only move", but Vishy here found the stronger 15…f6!, when the computer claims only 16.b4! keeps a clear advantage. Instead after 16.f4!? Vishy was right back in the game, and in fact, after Wesley gave up another pawn later in the game with 21.c6!?, a black win was at least as likely as one for White.
As often in such situations, however, the players decided to end the madness with a draw.
Wesley said he was two pawns down and was happy to make a draw, though he didn’t think Black was much better. Vishy commented, “I could have spent another one hour calculating and then taken the draw, but I didn’t think it was very practical!”
Wesley So has won all four mini-matches so far in this year's Norway Chess | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
That meant Vishy would keep a lead over Wesley whatever happened in the Armageddon, but it would turn out Vishy needed to win the Armageddon to keep the sole lead ahead of Magnus Carlsen. For most of the game it looked as though that was exactly what would happen, but as Vishy put it:
I played well, and the worst thing is when all the danger passes and then you blunder everything, but of course the problem was I didn’t see what his plan was.
Vishy regretted picking up a pawn on d3, but if he’d been alert he could have saved himself at the very last moment.
Here 31…Bxe2!, allowing White to capture on f6, still wins for Black. Instead Vishy played the automatic 31…dxe5? and after 32.Qf3!, hitting the d3-bishop and threatening Qxf6+ with mate-in-2, Wesley had won a piece. “I was so embarrassed, but what can you do, it’s just resigns on the spot!” said Vishy.
Instead Vishy played on for a while, but in vain.
“All glory to Jesus for the win — I thought all hope was lost in the Armageddon!” said Wesley.
He was in awe of Vishy Anand playing such chess at the age of 52, saying that he doubts he’d want to do the same at 50, and adding, “he probably loves chess five times more than me!”
Veselin Topalov came dressed for the occasion | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
Another piece was lost when it took a pawn on the d3-square in Armageddon in this clash, when Aryan played 23…Nxd3.
By that stage the alternatives weren’t good, but 24.Qf1! trapped the knight and Veselin went on to score a smooth win.
Aryan, who celebrates his 23rd birthday on the rest day, was nevertheless happy that he managed to escape with a draw in the classical game after going for an idea of which he later said, “Sometimes I get these temptations and I can’t stop myself!”
Veselin put his failure to win down to getting fixated on a plan.
Here, for instance, he saw 33.g4! was an option, but commented:
My plan was to put my pawns on the dark squares and go for an ending.
It never worked out, with Tari putting up excellent defence — the Norwegian no. 2 so far has three draws and one loss in classical chess.
MVL was unable to build on his win the day before as he lost to Radjabov | photo: Lennart Ootes, Norway Chess
The classical game here saw Maxime play his trusty Grünfeld. The first new move appeared on the board only on move 20 and things fizzled out into a 30-move draw.
In Armageddon the position looked innocuous on the surface, but Teimour was happy with his choice here.
He went for 25.Bc3, eyeing the a5 and b4-squares, and felt Black was in real trouble: “I was kind of happy, if you can be in Armageddon happy, for a few seconds!”
Teimour’s play that followed was utterly convincing as he eased to a second win with the white pieces in Armageddon.
That left the standings as follows going into the first rest day, with Magnus Carlsen catching Vishy Anand in the lead.
Things couldn’t be better set up for Round 5, since we’ve got a clash of the leaders, Anand-Carlsen. If there isn’t a winner in classical chess then Mamedyarov-So will be crucial — Wesley could take the sole lead, while Shakhriyar could catch the leader.
Don’t miss the Norway Chess commentary from Jan Gustafsson and Jovanka Houska from 17:00 CEST!
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