Road To The PCL Finals: China Pandas
The PRO Chess League finals start on Friday, so it's high time to take a closer look at the four teams that will be fighting for the title. Today: the China Pandas.
The PRO Chess League finals will take place on September 25-27 on Chess.com/Live with commentary on Chess.com/TV. Below are the four teams and their lineups.
Lineups PRO Chess League Finals
| # | Logo | Fed | Saint Louis Arch Bishops | Rapid Elo | Pts | Games | Perf |
| 1 |  |
Fabiano Caruana | 2773 | 19 | 28 | 2768 | |
| 2 | |
Leinier Dominguez | 2786 | 20 | 32 | 2713 | |
| 3 | |
Wesley So | 2741 | 24 | 32 | 2825 | |
| 4 | |
Jeffery Xiong | 2730 | 7 | 12 | 2658 | |
| # | Logo | Fed | China Pandas | Rapid Elo | Pts | Games | Perf |
| 1 |  |
Ding Liren | 2826 | 6 | 8 | 2733 | |
| 2 | |
Yu Yangyi | 2738 | 8 | 12 | 2747 | |
| 3 | |
Wei Yi | 2752 | 24.5 | 36 | 2769 | |
| 4 | |
Li Chao | 2645 | 11 | 19 | 2671 | |
| # | Logo | Fed | Armenia Eagles | Rapid Elo | Pts | Games | Perf |
| 1 |  |
Parham Maghsoodloo | 2532 | 7 | 12 | 2687 | |
| 2 | |
Haik Martirosyan | 2278 | 17 | 24 | 2766 | |
| 3 | |
Tigran Petrosian | 2637 | 7.5 | 16 | 2618 | |
| 4 | |
Raunak Sadhwani | 2454 | 5.5 | 8 | 2798 | |
| # | Logo | Fed | Canada Chessbrahs | Rapid Elo | Pts | Games | Perf |
| 1 |  |
Alexander Grischuk | 2784 | 26 | 36 | 2772 | |
| 2 | |
Anish Giri | 2731 | 9 | 12 | 2841 | |
| 3 | |
Ivan Saric | 2650 | 10 | 23 | 2583 | |
| 4 | |
Aryan Tari | 2519 | 7.5 | 8 | 2848 |
China Pandas
We are providing a closer look at all four teams and their roads to the finals. In this article, the focus is on the China Pandas.
The Pandas had no fewer than 10 players who played for their team this season. By far the most active was GM Wei Yi, who played 36 games and scored 24.5 points. GM Li Chao was good for 11 points from 19 games.
The other two players who will be in the finals, GMs Ding Liren and GM Yu Yangyi, scored 6/8 and 8/12 respectively.
As the top GMs were not always available, the Pandas struggled somewhat in the regular season this year. The team started with two losses, including their match with one of the other finalists: the Armenia Eagles.
The Pandas lost one more time, in the fifth round, but a total of six wins was just enough to finish in fourth place and make it to the playoffs.
With stronger lineups later than at the start, the Pandas started to get rolling and won in weeks three and four. Against the Hungary Hunters, they had three 2700 GMs who definitely helped in scoring an important 10.5-7.5 win as the Hunters would eventually finish in fifth place.
Li defeated GM Gabor Papp in a nice game. As it turned out, the king walk to g3 was still theory!
The China Pandas started their playoffs with a 9.5-6.5 win against the California Unicorns on March 4. Five days later, they eliminated the Germany Bears, champions of the Central Division, with the exact same score.
The best-performing player for the Pandas was Yu, who made 3.5/4. Here's his win vs. GM Arik Braun that ended in checkmate.
We're seeing the China Pandas in the semifinals for the third time. In their first season in 2018, the Chinese players reached the final but dramatically lost to the Armenia Eagles in a tiebreak. The two teams met again in the match for third place last year when the Pandas took small revenge.
While Wei has by far the most experience this season, Yu and Li bring a lot of PRO Chess League history as both have played in all three seasons that the Pandas have participated in. Together, the two have played a total of 123 games in 2018-2020!
The PRO Chess League finals will take place on September 25-27 on Chess.com. For the semifinals on Friday, Sept. 25, the Pandas face the favorites: the Saint Louis Arch Bishops. Incidentally, these teams have never played before.
The other semifinal is played between the Armenia Eagles and the Canada Chessbrahs. The two losing teams will then face each other on Saturday, Sept. 26, for a fight for third place, while the big final is scheduled for Sunday, Sept. 27.
Like in the regular season, time control for all games will be 10 minutes plus a two-second increment. Every player on a team will play every player on the other team for a total of 16 games. The four finalists will be competing for a $40,000 prize fund with $20,000 going to the winner. All matches will be streamed live with expert commentary on Chess.com/TV.
See also:
Peter Doggers joined a chess club a month before turning 15 and still plays for it. He used to be an active tournament player and holds two IM norms. Peter has a Master of Arts degree in Dutch Language & Literature. He briefly worked at New in Chess, then as a Dutch teacher and then in a project for improving safety and security in Amsterdam schools. Between 2007 and 2013 Peter was running ChessVibes, a major source for chess news and videos acquired by Chess.com in October 2013. As our Director News & Events, Peter writes many of our news reports. In the summer of 2022, The Guardian’s Leonard Barden described him as “widely regarded as the world’s best chess journalist.”
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