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Magnus Carlsen may still win Altibox Norway Chess for a first time, but he’s going to have to do it the hard way. His Round 8 loss to Levon Aronian was a first in 43 games, and saw the Armenian no. 1 catch him on 5/8. Three players are half a point back, including Vladimir Kramnik, who won a trademark positional game against Harikrishna and now faces arch-rival Veselin Topalov in the final round.
Levon Aronian picked up his second win in a row - a late dash to the Norway Chess finish line? | photo: Fiona Steil-Antoni
Yet again all five games were real fights in Round 8 of Altibox Norway Chess:
Replay the full live commentary with Peter Svidler and Jan Gustafsson:
Even the two draws could, surprisingly, have been won by the underdogs, who had the black pieces. Something went wrong for Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in his opening preparation against Veselin Topalov's Berlin, and on move 16 he’d already gone seriously astray.
A fight of good against evil? | photo: Fiona Steil-Antoni
He explained he was sure there was a good plan for White, but we weren’t going to get any enlightenment on that subject:
If I could have remembered I would have played it, and I wouldn’t have said too much about it!
Not for the first time, though, despite so much going wrong the Berlin held, with MVL also not holding back when asked for his opinion on the opening:
It’s an evil opening! I’m like the only good guy who’s fighting it right now.
Peter Svidler helpfully offered the meme-tastic, “Come over to the dark side – we have cookies!”, though for now Maxime is happy with his Najdorf.
Giri and Grandelius chat with Jan Gustafsson, who has somehow escaped the studio | photo: Fiona Steil-Antoni
Nils Grandelius was also perilously close to a victory over Anish Giri, with the latter admitting his opening could have gone better:
I bluffed a little bit in the opening in the sense that if Black plays anything other than 10…exd4 11.exd4 Nb6 it’s a playable position, but he went 10…exd4 11.exd4 Nb6...
Don't you just hate it when that happens! Perhaps Anish needed some help?
Even after that minor setback things didn’t seem dire for White, but Giri went on to lose a pawn and decided desperate measures were called for, playing 22.Ne4!?:
There followed 22…Bd5? and Giri was able, as he explained, to show kids that if a knight is as badly placed as the one on a6 you can sacrifice a piece and still draw! 23.Nf6+! gxf6 24.Bxf6 Qf5 25.Qxh6 Qh7 26.Qg5+ and Black had no good way to avoid perpetual check. The fly in the ointment was that instead 22…Bf5! (controlling the b1-h7 diagonal) is much stronger, with the knight sac no longer working. Anish had dodged a bullet.
The most significant game of the day was, of course, Levon Aronian’s clinch victory over the tournament leader.
A rare difficult day for Magnus Carlsen | photo: Jose Huwaidi
There were varying explanations for what went wrong here, though it was clear something was up from the very beginning. Magnus spent six minutes on his second move after 1.c4 Nf6 2.g3, with Henrik Carlsen apparently explaining the delay as related to Magnus arriving late at the board. Carlsen himself explained it as more chess-related:
It was a series of poor choices and also some pretty bad time management. He completely surprised me in the opening, of course, but you’re never going to be too sad when your opponent plays 2.g3.
What followed was eerily familiar from the day before, when Carlsen had effortlessly achieved a winning position against Kramnik. Big Vlad himself noted, more than a little tongue-in-cheek:
Today’s game of Levon with Magnus was very strange. My only explanation was that Magnus was celebrating too much yesterday, because his play was, I’m sorry to tell, but so bad, to get such a bad position so quickly. I thought maybe he had a terrible hangover!
Magnus spent another 25 minutes on his 9th move and admitted to underestimating White’s 13.f4, to which he felt his 13…Nd6 response was just a clear blunder:
In the forced play that followed Carlsen lost a pawn with his structure also torn to shreds: 14.Bc3! Rb8 15.Qa3 b6 16.Bxa5 bxa5 17.Nb3 Nb7 18.Bxb7 Qxb7 19.Nxc5.
Levon noted it was nice to win a "must-win" game on demand... the caliber of his opponent was a bonus! | photo: Fiona Steil-Antoni
Magnus in top form would still surely have put up significant resistance after that – especially as Levon has had a habit of losing won positions against the World Champion and joked himself about his “infamous technique” – but instead the first hint of an attack was immediately decisive, with 26…Qxe5 27.Rd8+! the point of no return. After 27…Kf7 28.Qf3+! the choice was awful:
If Black plays 28…Qf5 29.Qxf5+ gxf5 the pin on the 8th rank leaves Black utterly helpless after the simple 30.Kf2 (to avoid a check on b1). 28…Bf5 29.Bxb8 Qxb8 30.g4! was obviously no better, and Carlsen resigned next move. He revealed he’d been blundering mate-in-1 in his analysis and continued to blunder material in the post-mortem, so he decided it was time to call it a day!
Vladimir Kramnik bounced straight back after his loss to Magnus | photo: Jose Huwaidi
The other wins were very different. Vladimir Kramnik followed his habit in recent years of playing strange, apparently innocuous opening choices with White, though 1.Nf3 e6 2.g3 b5 3.e3 was extravagant even for him!
He explained:
2.g3 and next e3 is quite a way to play, but actually it makes some sense. I have this idea of playing then c4 and d4. It looks like losing a tempo, but it might be gaining a tempo. The pawn on a6 is worse than on a7, and I need the pawn on e3 to support d4… Basically my preparation was 9.d4 and then we play – I don’t know what the computer says about this position!
Whether we believe that or not, Vladimir got the kind of Catalan position he plays better than anyone else in the world, and without particularly clear mistakes from Harikrishna a pawn dropped and the rest did turn out to be a matter of technique.
The last game to finish was Eljanov-Li Chao, which initially seemed to be going well for Pavel, until the balance swung in the Chinese star’s favour. Eljanov decided to force his opponent into a sacrifice with 34.Rd5:
After 34…e2 35.Rxe5 Rxe5 the question for the remainder of the game was whether White could force a draw by perpetual check. At one point Kramnik was asked to give his professional assessment and concluded:
Let them play! That’s my suggestion.
Although the position appears to have been objectively drawn, Li Chao succeeded in pushing and queening his g-pawn and then plotting a course away from checks by the white queen. A formidable and mind-boggling game!
A long game and a 2nd loss in a row was arguably not what Pavel Eljanov needed before meeting Magnus Carlsen in the final round | photo: Fiona Steil-Antoni
So before the final round no less than seven players have a theoretical chance to tie for first place and force a play-off. The latest standings are below:
The final round pairings mean that Magnus nevertheless remains the favourite.
He has White against a player he’s beaten 3:0 and who has lost his last two games, while Aronian plays Black. If they both draw or worse, though, then MVL or one of Topalov-Kramnik could very easily join them. That famous grudge match-up has tended to produce decisive results in recent years. Tune in to Peter and Jan's live commentary on Altibox Norway Chess Round 9 from 16:00 CEST on Friday.
During the penultimate round the boat had sailed, but it wasn't clear for who... | photo: Fiona Steil-Antoni
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