FIDE Candidates 2024 Round 11
Chess is a knife fight.
We had a lot of decisive games this round. It seemed like Fabi escaped a worse position with the Black pieces against Gukesh in a relatively normal Queen’s Gambit Declined, but on every other board, there were eventual explosive finales.
Alireza Firouzja - Nijat Abasov
Perhaps the most one-sided encounter of the entire tournament thus far, Firouzja again played a Reti-Nimzo-Larsen attack, this time against fellow 0%-chancer Abasov.
Here Abasov went wrong with 15…e5? 16.Nc4 f6?
With mounting weaknesses on the light squares and a disconnected rook on the back rank, Alireza could tell that this was asking too much of the position for Black, so he first traded off the rook with 17.Rd5! Rxd5 18.Bxd5+ Kh8
Look at the centralization. Clearly a nightmare position for Black! It didn’t take long for Abasov to falter under the pressure, and it was fascinating to see just how quickly Alireza dissected the undeveloped queenside. After 19.Bc5 Qd7 20.Bf3 Rb8…
…Black saved the exchange, but at the cost of the remaining pieces on the back rank: 21.Bxa7 Ra8 22.Nb6 Qxd1 23.Rxd1 Rxa7 24.Rd8! 1-0
Praggnanandhaa R - Hikaru Nakamura
In a symmetrical Queen’s Pawn Opening, the game had entered a queenless middlegame by move 7:
It seemed like the game was destined for a draw, but Pragg’s position had some problems, and Hikaru was able to pressure weaknesses with a massively active position. Take a look at the position after 27.g4:
It’s easy to see that Black has the more active position, and White has many weaknesses: the b2-pawn is backwards. The f1 rook is unemployed and looking for a new job. The Knights on c3 and e3 do control some central squares, but also seem redundant and unable to improve. The c1 rook doesn’t have much in the way of activity. Meanwhile all of Black’s pieces are peeking potential infiltration points on the queenside. Pragg began to go wrong: 27…fxg4 28.Nxg4 Nxf4 29.Ke3??
Very clearly, Pragg wants the e4-pawn! But the problem is how exposed the king has become, and despite queen’s being off the board, all of the Black pieces are capable of controlling the squares around the king and trapping it. Naka went for 29…Nd5+ 30.Kxe4 Nxc3+ 31.bxc3 c5 32.Rf4?
Naka found the only winning move: 32…Bd5!, followed by 33.Ke3 h5!, and the victory was just a matter of time, as the knight is trapped — moving it to f2 takes away a retreat square for White and exposes the king to discoveries, and otherwise it must move to h6 where it is eventually doomed. Nakamura later won an instructive endgame a piece up.
Vidit Gujrathi - Ian Nepomniachtchi
History is repeating itself:
Petrov Defense by Nepo.
Heroic Defense in a bad position by Nepo.
Equal Endgame between Vidit and Nepo
Vidit collapses under the pressure after fighting for a win
Nepo gets ahead of the pack.
The whole game has an epic story line that I won’t recount, but I do think the endgame is worth taking a look at:
In this position Vidit’s got the White pieces and a pretty promising edge. His Knight on f6 is powerfully placed, and Nepo’s pieces aren’t as active. With this last push, Nepo has given Vidit the opportunity to create a passed pawn. For instance: 37.Nxd5! Nxd5 38.cxd5. This pawn would be very difficult to prevent from promoting without giving up the queenside, and would be a constant thorn in Black’s side.
Instead, Vidit played 37.Kc2? and after 37.,,dxc4, Nepo’s game was comfortably safe. Both players reached the time control, but had something to play for, so play continued and progress was made.
Both players are low on time — Vidit has less than a minute. But Nepo was cool under the pressure. Vidit blundered hard with 60.Nb2+?? and Nepo instantly responded with 60…Kd2!, hitting the White rook with tempo, so Vidit had to move it. But this allowed Ian a critical tempo to play the move 61…c4!
Black has trapped White’s King and now threatens a rook move with discovered check. It was extremely heart breaking to watch Vidit go through every emotion in the pressure of the clock that must have felt like an eternity. He held on for a few move moves, but Nepo saw the win and orchestrated it masterfully. The way this game ended, reminds me of the saying that chess is a knife fight, not a gentleman’s duel.
This round provided some huge shake-ups on the standings. Nepo stands alone in first, but Naka and Gukesh now stand side by side half a point behind him. Fabi stepped up to fourth place, and Pragg now sits in 5th. I still feel like the top four players have some chances, but for Fabi (who I’ve been rooting for this whole cycle), it feels like the next three games are Must-Wins. Nakamura will face Gukesh and Nepo in the future rounds, and so those games are massively important — it really is up to him from this point forward and he can’t rely on other players knocking them down. Nepo looks poised to win, but Gukesh is dangerous and in top form. This has been one of the greatest tournaments in our generation and it’s not even done yet. Three rounds left!