Vishy Anand took the sole lead in Norway Chess after beating Magnus Carlsen in Armageddon, but the 52-year-old was upset that he’d outplayed the current World Champion in classical chess only to let a winning position slip. Vishy leads Magnus by half a point, with Wesley So and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov a further point back after Shakh won a spectacular Armageddon. Anish Giri and Aryan Tari scored the day’s only classical wins to boost their tournament standings.
You can replay all the games from Norway Chess 2022 using the selector below.
And here’s the day’s live commentary from Jan Gustafsson and Jovanka Houska.
In Round 5 Aryan Tari and Anish Giri picked up a full 3 points for winning in classical chess, while Vishy Anand, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave scored 1.5 points for winning in Armageddon.
The clash between the 15th and 16th World Chess Champions couldn’t have been set up better, since the players came into the battle as the co-leaders of Norway Chess, with the Armageddon system meaning that we had to have a winner.
At first, however, it seemed as though no Armageddon would be needed. In an Italian game Vishy questioned Magnus’ 10…h6!?, while our commentary team laid the blame on 14…b5!?, but in any case White was soon clearly on top.
Play continued 18.b4! Nb7 19.Re2, with Vishy later commenting:
It’s a pity, because I really played a good game, I outplayed him. He took some liberties in the opening, some careless moves really, and then I punished him very well with Re2, all these things I did beautifully.
After 19…cxb4 20.cxb4 a5! 21.axb5 axb4 22.Rb1 Qd7? things were looking dire for Black.
Vishy himself pointed out that 22…Nc5! had instead been a chance for Magnus.
The only thing is that afterwards I saw that instead of Qd7 you could go 22…Nc5 23.Rxb4 Ra1, which is a bit irritating. You have something bobbing around there. I guess 24.b6 should work, but here I’m less in control. I was surprised that he let me go with 22…Qd7?, because normally speaking this is just "resigns".
After 23.Reb2 Nc5 24.Rxb4 Qf5 25.Be3! Vishy said “it’s basically curtains!”
It continued to go like a dream all the way up to 31…c4!, which turned out to be an excellent practical decision by Magnus.
Vishy commented:
With the pawn on b7 I was wondering what the evaluation would be. I thought it must be +5 or something, in fact it’s about +3.5, at least on my phone, and I don’t know why I played 32.Rc6. To have such a chance in this tournament and then to throw it away like this is really terrible.
Vishy later realised that 32.Qg4!, with Nf5 to follow, is winning, while he also pointed out the strong 32.Qa4. Instead his 32.Rc6?! allowed 32…Qd3!
Vishy said he’d miscalculated that 33.Qxd3 cxd3 34.Nf5 is winning (34…Bf8! holds things together), while after 33.Qf1!? Bf8 34.Rxc4 Qxf1+ the position fizzled out fast, with the pawn on b7 soon falling.
That was a heavy blow for Vishy, who commented on the 20 minutes between the classical and Armageddon:
There are no words. I brought my computer but I didn’t bother even switching it on. I was going to check something for the Armageddon, but after this game I just sat there like a zombie.
As it happened, however, it was Vishy who adapted better, at least in the sense that he played faster and made excellent use of the 3-minute starting advantage for White. It was an epic game, with Magnus early on showing some great resourcefulness. 23…Nf2! was a beautiful move, relying on the fact that if you capture the knight a fork with e3+ will follow.
Vishy was satisfied with his position as well, however, since he had to win and, “I have to do something, I have to unbalance the position!”
His 4-minute lead on the clock would prove critical, as Magnus missed the winning 36…Nxg5! 37.Rxg5+ Kf8 and instead with 36…Rh4? allowed 37.Bxd5!, removing the defence of the e4-knight.
Black had completely lost control, but in the mayhem that followed Magnus had chances to equalise after Vishy missed a way to enter a won endgame (39.Qg3!).
The final stages saw Magnus attempting the almost impossible — to play with 1-second on his clock, getting 1 second added each move. It would be tough even in a technical position, but Vishy was dropping bombs!
Here Vishy played 43.g5!?, commenting:
g5 is actually irresponsible given the needs of the position. My opponent would have played 43.Qd4! without thinking.
Why had he done it? “I saw a cheapo!” said Vishy. After 43…Nh5 44.g6 it’s tempting to play 44…Nf4.
Here Vishy had spotted that 45.g7+! wins (he also noted 45.Qd8+!), but called it “not great!” that he went for this trick. Magnus played 44…fxg6?, allowing 45.Qd8+, while 44…Qc5+ would still have posed problems.
It was all but a mission impossible for Magnus with one second, however, and the game ended as he eventually blundered his knight.
It was a wonderful fight, though only a small consolation for Vishy, who commented:
I’ll take the half point. I already blew it against Wesley [he lost an Armageddon where he was completely winning], so it would have been a pity to do it again.
Vishy was also full of praise for his opponent.
I’ve said many times that he is very, very impressive. You just have to look at his tournament record and that he consistently pushes his limits so much. I’ve no words, he’s just fantastic!
The classical draw in Anand-Carlsen meant that Wesley So or Shakhriyar Mamedyarov could have joined the lead with a win in classical chess, but they played out what at least on the surface looked like a very dry draw. Shakh expressed puzzlement later at his opponent’s willingness to go for what looked like an unpleasant endgame, while Wesley regretted one move (39…Nb3) that left him needing to do some work. In the end, however, it was just a prelude to the real action.
“In the Armageddon he just played any random opening!” said Wesley.
Mamedyarov would later describe it as a dream position for Armageddon, though the cold-blooded computer was giving a -2 evaluation in Wesley’s favour. It all turned, however, when Wesley went for the thematic 16…d3? at the worst possible moment.
After 17.Qb1! dxe2 18.fxe5 it turned out White had a huge attack, and more importantly it was the kind of position that Shakh plays as well as anyone in the world. There were inaccuracies, but spotting them in a blitz game was another matter, and Shakh found some brilliant moves.
29.Kf3! came after a think that lasted 1 minute and 22 seconds, with Shakh admitting he’d almost blundered away the game. He was planning 29.Qxd5 (threatening Nf6+) 29…Qxh2+ 30.Kd3, but only noticed the flaw in his plan at the very last moment.
White would be winning if not for 30…d1=Q+! and e.g. 31.Raxd1 Qc2# Running with the king only delays mate.
As it was Shakhriyar eventually crashed through to score the win his play deserved.
Maxime admitted things had gone badly wrong for him in the classical game against Veselin, leaving him scrambling to make a draw with White. In Armageddon, however, White has been dominating, with Round 5 leaving the overall score at an incredible 14 wins for White to just 2 for Black.
Maxime is perhaps the world’s best player when it comes to toppling the Berlin, and he made it look easy as he played what he called “an old idea” to get an edge. He felt Veselin was already in trouble before 19…Qf6?
That lost a pawn to 20.Qxf6! Nxf6 21.hxg6 hxg6 22.Bxg6!
If you take on g6 the e6-bishop falls, though 22…Kg7 23.Bd3 was not an improvement and Maxime went on to wrap up a comfortable win.
The two classical wins were notable for blunders, with Teimour’s coming very early on. 5…d6?! had been played over 400 times, though it was punished much less often.
6.d4! took advantage of the black setup, with Anish explaining:
The same thing happened to him as happened to me the day before when I played Magnus. We both knew the variation very, very well, but he just mixed up the move-order. Sometimes when you analyse the games, your openings, you often use the button, the next move, the arrow, instead of inputting moves, and so you open your file and you start analysing further, move 10-15 or whatever, and sometimes you wonder, but how did this position arise, is it d6 first or 0-0? I think Etienne Bacrot once also mixed up this order, and that gave me a small edge from the start. I think he didn’t handle the position very well and I just got a fantastic advantage from the opening.
As with Anish against Magnus, the position perhaps wasn’t initially so bad, but Teimour failed to put up any resistance as Anish cruised to a win.
Anish talked afterwards about “the sheer relief of not having to play Armageddon”. He also explained that he’d managed to get over the loss to Magnus by focusing on the upcoming game, something he said he’d learned from Vladimir Kramnik.
You cannot have your mind empty! You have to replace the bad things with the good ones.
There was also a first classical win of this year’s Norway Chess for Aryan Tari, though he admitted the opening hadn’t exactly gone to plan when he played the manoeuvre 10.Nf1, 11.Ne3, 12.Nf1.
Here a puzzled Wang Hao played 12…f5!, with Aryan commenting:
I don’t know how it’s possible, but after 12.Nf1 I thought 12…f5 was impossible because of 13.Ng3, I think, but then he has 13…Nf6, so after 12.Nf1 f5 I just wanted to die at the board!
Tari expected to be in for a long struggle for a draw while Wang Hao thought he couldn’t lose, but his clock-handling would be his downfall.
I somehow couldn’t control my time. I thought too much in some wrong variation and blundered something… Then I just played like an amateur! If you haven’t played any games for a long time, it’s very difficult when you don’t have enough time to think.
Wang Hao was already in a tricky position (the only move was 40…Bd6) when he played 40…d3+??
Aryan could simply take the bishop on e5 and win the game, with both players struggling to believe what had happened!
Wang Hao was still in good spirits afterwards, saying of his decision to make a draw in the game on a giant chessboard on the rest day, “I think that was the right decision, otherwise some guys will miss their lunch!”
So the standings look as follows with four rounds to go.
Vishy will be looking to defend his lead with Black vs. Anish Giri in Round 6, while Magnus Carlsen has White against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov.
As you can see, Carlsen’s lifetime score is 7 wins to 2, though Shakh memorably defeated Magnus 2.5:0.5 in the final round of the recent Oslo Esports Cup, depriving the World Champion of overall victory. Wesley So is within striking distance of the lead and has White against Tari.
Don’t miss the Norway Chess commentary from Jan Gustafsson and Jovanka Houska from 17:00 CEST!
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