Good evening to all! Wish that all of you are having a good day!The heading pretty much sums up how the 9th round of the Championships went! Now let us look at the Round!
Round 9: Carlsen v/s Caruana 1/2-1/2
Carlsen began with the English Four Knights Opening( as I had predicted) yet continued with 4. g3 instead of 4. e3 when I had suggested that any of these options can be good- based on where Carlsen has better preparations. Carlsen showed a relatively new idea which however, Caruana had analysed in the comforts of his home:
Carlsen played this relatively rare idea which quiet probably is not a part of GM Avrukh's repertoire book mentioned in the Game 9 Predictions. This was done to get Caruana out of book( which did not manage to be the case) and to get a fresh position over the board and let the surprise factor guide him through for the rest of the game. Credits: Sagar Shah
This is a rather typical move in the Siccilian Dragon with the Black pieces and hence Caruana had analysed this back home. He quickly snapped on c3 followed by ....f6. This very likely would not have been analysed by Avrukh in his book. On the following moves, Caruana took quiet some time and fell back considerably on time. For the records, 53.5 minutes for the moves 12-17. The position was approximately balanced yet he was taking time, thus making it uncomfortable to play for him( with one having more time, one does feel much more superior.)
Here comes the first critical moment of the game: Caruana snapped on f3 leading to an opposite-coloured Bishop middlegame with a weaker King and a worse Bishop as compared to the White light-squared Bishop. People had mixed opinions about this move. Adams, one of the top players of the last 20 years called this logical with Sagar Shah calling it 'inexplicable'. Credits: Sagar Shah
Sums up today's game pretty clearly: Carlsen seems dissatisfied with his missed half-chance while Caruana's focused attitude,composure and alertness helped him hold to a well-played draw due to good dogged-defense. Credits: Maria Emaelianova
Caruana explained his decision in the press conference with the following: "I have other moves I can play – 17…Na5, I can play 17…Qd7 or 17…Be4 – I have so many moves here, but I didn’t feel totally comfortable. I thought if I start to drift it could get very unpleasant. White's moves are easy – e3 and then Nd2 at some point. So I wanted to make it more concrete. Of course I’m basically admitting that my position is very unpleasant, but still the drawing margin is very high with these opposite-coloured bishops… I have less time, so I thought it will be easier to play if I simplify the position a bit." Credits: Chess24.com
You can watch the whole press conference here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsfQwPhcokA
The position then transposed to the opposite-coloured Bishop middlegame wherein White has some significant advantage and was the one who was pushing and pressing for getting an advantage. White was definitely slightly better and Magnus admitted in the press conference for the opening to be a success for the current game. ' Team Magnus' got it's mojo back finally!
The chances of Carlsen winning are more than 25% and so are Fabiano's chances. Carlsen's chances of winning in Classical format are still a bit more according to the stimulator yet it is almost equal. Credits: SmarterChess
Alex Colovic in his review noticed a trend which he thought was significant especially for this match: Usually in these games, there is just one chance which is not the most easy to make and can be missed. After missing that chance however, the position often gets very equalish he claimed. He had been to the tournament hall for this game.
According to Jonathan Rowson, it was Caruana's 'complete lack of neuroticism' which made him an extremely difficult opponent for Carlsen. Caruana does not fear ghosts in positions wherein he is slightly worse and which Carlsen is famed of proving his mettle at. He fears the best moves and not the opponent he rightfully claimed. Now on to the second critical moment to understand things more clearly:
By this point Carlsen had a definite advantage on the clock as well as on the position. Carlsen had a significant advantage in the position because of the superior Bishop( with Black's Bishop being severely restricted by the pawn on e3) and the Black King being weaker than the White King. Here Carlsen went for the dynamic h4-h5. Credits: Sagar Shah
White has a significant advantage due to the following reasons:
1.) This is an opposite-coloured Bishop middle game. The side who has the attack is often the side with the advantage in these sorts of positions. White has an attack brewing up on the Kingside and is therefore preferable.
2.) The second important factor in these sorts of positions is the Bishop itself! The White Bishop has the long h1-a8 diagnol under it's control while the Black Bishop is restricted by the White "e3" pawn. Therefore White has some definite Initiative in the position.
So why did Caruana willingly go for such a position wherein he would be worse? The reason for this is as he said that he wanted to be more concrete and the position would be simpler to play in time trouble. White while being better cannot do much and there are some positions in chess when even when being better, one cannot make much further progress. Caruana wished for this when he went for such a decision. This is a decision frequently made by Sergey Karjakin, who had a reputation of defending worse yet very defendable positions. That's also the reason for the article being titled- ' Caruana does a Karjakin'!
h4-h5 from Carlsen was a hasty decision which allowed ....gh5 followed by ....h4 as both the White Kings and the Black Kings are not safe anymore. That is why White's advantage now significantly reduces. He could have instead continued with 24. Kg2 followed by Rh1 with the idea of playing h4-h5 with realistic initiative. Carlsen explained during the press-conference that if he did not play 24. h5, Black would have played 24...h5 himself, consolidated the position and then it is very difficult to break'. This shows that Carlsen does believe it is difficult to break solid positions, which he once famously said he did not believe in during the World Chess Championship 2016. After this, the game quickly dissipated into a draw. Carlsen was not looking very thrilled in the press-conference which one can watch in the link given above in the article. Here are some important exerpts of an amazing interview of Ernesto Inarkiev, a regular World top-100 player for around a decade now: Here are his impressions based on his interview given here to Vladimir Barsky:
http://ruchess.ru/en/news/all/carlsen_caruana_match_game_9_is_drawn/.
Focused, calm, confident and hard-working. Caruana is displaying all the traits for a Future World Champion. He has held up his own so far. Yet can he go the distance? Being the young challenger, he does have more energy and looks poised and determined. Credits: Niki Riga
He believed that Caruana's 17... Bf3 was due to fatigue and due to him probably believing in the upcoming position being a draw.
He emphasized that Carlsen was playing quickly until the 24th move and the 24th move could likely be a result of momentum being on the side of playing more quickly and one decision made due to fatigue. Playing in fatigue, one often plays more quickly than usual, claimed Inarkiev. He also noticed that Carlsen has thus far been unable to outplay Caruana from equal position- one trait he used to exploit from 2008-2015 quiet convincingly.
He claimed that who will be the favourite depends on who has the momentum at the end of 12 Classical games, a very logical and balanced view.
Round 9: Carlsen v/s Caruana 1/2-1/2
Carlsen began with the English Four Knights Opening( as I had predicted) yet continued with 4. g3 instead of 4. e3 when I had suggested that any of these options can be good- based on where Carlsen has better preparations. Carlsen showed a relatively new idea which however, Caruana had analysed in the comforts of his home:
Carlsen played this relatively rare idea which quiet probably is not a part of GM Avrukh's repertoire book mentioned in the Game 9 Predictions. This was done to get Caruana out of book( which did not manage to be the case) and to get a fresh position over the board and let the surprise factor guide him through for the rest of the game. Credits: Sagar Shah
This is a rather typical move in the Siccilian Dragon with the Black pieces and hence Caruana had analysed this back home. He quickly snapped on c3 followed by ....f6. This very likely would not have been analysed by Avrukh in his book. On the following moves, Caruana took quiet some time and fell back considerably on time. For the records, 53.5 minutes for the moves 12-17. The position was approximately balanced yet he was taking time, thus making it uncomfortable to play for him( with one having more time, one does feel much more superior.)
Here comes the first critical moment of the game: Caruana snapped on f3 leading to an opposite-coloured Bishop middlegame with a weaker King and a worse Bishop as compared to the White light-squared Bishop. People had mixed opinions about this move. Adams, one of the top players of the last 20 years called this logical with Sagar Shah calling it 'inexplicable'. Credits: Sagar Shah
Sums up today's game pretty clearly: Carlsen seems dissatisfied with his missed half-chance while Caruana's focused attitude,composure and alertness helped him hold to a well-played draw due to good dogged-defense. Credits: Maria Emaelianova
Caruana explained his decision in the press conference with the following: "I have other moves I can play – 17…Na5, I can play 17…Qd7 or 17…Be4 – I have so many moves here, but I didn’t feel totally comfortable. I thought if I start to drift it could get very unpleasant. White's moves are easy – e3 and then Nd2 at some point. So I wanted to make it more concrete. Of course I’m basically admitting that my position is very unpleasant, but still the drawing margin is very high with these opposite-coloured bishops… I have less time, so I thought it will be easier to play if I simplify the position a bit." Credits: Chess24.com
You can watch the whole press conference here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XsfQwPhcokA
The position then transposed to the opposite-coloured Bishop middlegame wherein White has some significant advantage and was the one who was pushing and pressing for getting an advantage. White was definitely slightly better and Magnus admitted in the press conference for the opening to be a success for the current game. ' Team Magnus' got it's mojo back finally!
The chances of Carlsen winning are more than 25% and so are Fabiano's chances. Carlsen's chances of winning in Classical format are still a bit more according to the stimulator yet it is almost equal. Credits: SmarterChess
Alex Colovic in his review noticed a trend which he thought was significant especially for this match: Usually in these games, there is just one chance which is not the most easy to make and can be missed. After missing that chance however, the position often gets very equalish he claimed. He had been to the tournament hall for this game.
According to Jonathan Rowson, it was Caruana's 'complete lack of neuroticism' which made him an extremely difficult opponent for Carlsen. Caruana does not fear ghosts in positions wherein he is slightly worse and which Carlsen is famed of proving his mettle at. He fears the best moves and not the opponent he rightfully claimed. Now on to the second critical moment to understand things more clearly:
By this point Carlsen had a definite advantage on the clock as well as on the position. Carlsen had a significant advantage in the position because of the superior Bishop( with Black's Bishop being severely restricted by the pawn on e3) and the Black King being weaker than the White King. Here Carlsen went for the dynamic h4-h5. Credits: Sagar Shah
White has a significant advantage due to the following reasons:
1.) This is an opposite-coloured Bishop middle game. The side who has the attack is often the side with the advantage in these sorts of positions. White has an attack brewing up on the Kingside and is therefore preferable.
2.) The second important factor in these sorts of positions is the Bishop itself! The White Bishop has the long h1-a8 diagnol under it's control while the Black Bishop is restricted by the White "e3" pawn. Therefore White has some definite Initiative in the position.
So why did Caruana willingly go for such a position wherein he would be worse? The reason for this is as he said that he wanted to be more concrete and the position would be simpler to play in time trouble. White while being better cannot do much and there are some positions in chess when even when being better, one cannot make much further progress. Caruana wished for this when he went for such a decision. This is a decision frequently made by Sergey Karjakin, who had a reputation of defending worse yet very defendable positions. That's also the reason for the article being titled- ' Caruana does a Karjakin'!
h4-h5 from Carlsen was a hasty decision which allowed ....gh5 followed by ....h4 as both the White Kings and the Black Kings are not safe anymore. That is why White's advantage now significantly reduces. He could have instead continued with 24. Kg2 followed by Rh1 with the idea of playing h4-h5 with realistic initiative. Carlsen explained during the press-conference that if he did not play 24. h5, Black would have played 24...h5 himself, consolidated the position and then it is very difficult to break'. This shows that Carlsen does believe it is difficult to break solid positions, which he once famously said he did not believe in during the World Chess Championship 2016. After this, the game quickly dissipated into a draw. Carlsen was not looking very thrilled in the press-conference which one can watch in the link given above in the article. Here are some important exerpts of an amazing interview of Ernesto Inarkiev, a regular World top-100 player for around a decade now: Here are his impressions based on his interview given here to Vladimir Barsky:
http://ruchess.ru/en/news/all/carlsen_caruana_match_game_9_is_drawn/.
Focused, calm, confident and hard-working. Caruana is displaying all the traits for a Future World Champion. He has held up his own so far. Yet can he go the distance? Being the young challenger, he does have more energy and looks poised and determined. Credits: Niki Riga
He believed that Caruana's 17... Bf3 was due to fatigue and due to him probably believing in the upcoming position being a draw.
He emphasized that Carlsen was playing quickly until the 24th move and the 24th move could likely be a result of momentum being on the side of playing more quickly and one decision made due to fatigue. Playing in fatigue, one often plays more quickly than usual, claimed Inarkiev. He also noticed that Carlsen has thus far been unable to outplay Caruana from equal position- one trait he used to exploit from 2008-2015 quiet convincingly.
He claimed that who will be the favourite depends on who has the momentum at the end of 12 Classical games, a very logical and balanced view.
Comments
Post a Comment