Women's WCh 2016, 7-8: Hou Yifan on the brink

Hou Yifan will today regain her World Championship title if she can draw, or better, with the white pieces against the reigning Women's World Champion Mariya Muzychuk. With a two-point lead and only two games to play, it's hard to believe in any outcome other than a victory for the Chinese star, though of course a win today for Mariya would suddenly add a huge amount of tension to the final game.

Hou Yifan has dominated the match so far | photo: official website

Hou Yifan is on course to regain her crown. Although Mariya Muzychuk is playing decent chess and has been posing serious problems - especially in the opening - she's failed to knock the women's no. 1 off-balance.

Let's take a quick look at the last two games, which although drawn featured long battles in which Mariya gave her all to put pressure on Hou Yifan.

The match is drawing to a close in Potocki Palace, Lviv | photo: official website

In Game 7 Hou Yifan managed, for the first time, to gain an advantage against her opponent's Open Ruy Lopez. That positional advantage evaporated, though, and Mariya was left with more active pieces that she could used to apply pressure. It's possible Hou Yifan was never in any real danger, but you could sense that for one of the first times in the match she was being outplayed in the middlegame. Ultimately Mariya was unable to convert an extra pawn in a rook ending that finished on move 81.

Game 8, where Mariya had White, looked like the last good opportunity to keep the match intrigue alive - and it didn't disappoint! Mariya opened with 1.d4, intending to keep pieces on the board and engage in a long battle. After move 15 she had already achieved her aim and we reached one of the key positions of the game:

White's space advantage and the closed centre promise White the chance to whip up a dangerous attack on the kingside. How can that be stopped? The central break with f6 would leave e6 very weak. Hou Yifan, however, came up with 15...g5!, followed by the original plan of Kg7, Rh8, Qg8 and Kf8. Although Mariya did eventually manage to break with f4 and Hou Yifan's position remained somewhat passive, objectively she didn't suffer any great problems. A draw was agreed on move 44, with the position completely blocked.

So the score makes grim reading for Mariya Muzychuk's fans:

Will Hou Yifan be crowned Champion on Monday? Follow Game 9 of the match here on chess24 from 14:30 CET! You can replay the earlier games using the selector below:

You can also play through the games in our free mobile apps: