Ding vs Nepo, A (Late) World Chess Championship Prediction Blog

Hold on. Some of you might be reading this and saying, "Not another one." However, I hope to make this one special and different from others. How will I do this? Well, to do that you will have to read my blog. I was very busy, and so was not able to get this out on time, but since the score is still tied(It is 2-2) I decided to finish and publish it. There are several interesting factors in this match including that Ding earned his spot in the Canidates because Karjakin was not allowed to play, and that Magnus dropped out which is the only reason that Ding Liren is playing. I am going to skip the whole part about whether or not Magnus would play. However, here is a good blog about that. The World Chess Championship will be happening in Astana, Kazakhstan.

Who Ian Nepomniachtchi is:

Ian Nepomniachtchi is the going to be playing in the World Chess Championship. Chess.com sponsors him. He was born on July 14, 1990 in Bryansk, 350 km from Moscow. Ian learned to play before he turned 5.                                                                                                                                     

His first coach was FM Valentin Ekimenko. However, Valentin soon realized that Ian needed a better coach and so Valery Zilberstein began coaching him. Zilberstien died in 2005, and Ian holds the Zilberstein Memorial tournament every year. He won 3 straight European Chess Championships from 2000-2002. He won the World Youth Championship for players under 12, just beating Magnus. He was the 2nd player to qualify for the Canidates and win the World Youth Championship. At this time, Nepo was believed by the Russian press to be the rising star of chess. At the age of 12 he nearly won the U-18 World Chess Championship. He gained 200 points inbetween 2003 and 2007. In 2006 he qualifed for the Russia Championship Superfinal. He lost 3-4 to Evgeny Alekseev. Also in 2006 he played on a reserve board for the Tomsk-400 chess team captained by GM Alexander Khasin. The other players on the team were: GMs Levon Aronian, Alexander Morozevich, Dmitry Jakovenko, Victor Bologan, and Vladislav Tkachiev. They came 3rd in the Russian Team Chess Championship and won the European Club Cup. In 2007 he came 2nd in Tata Steel. Also in 2007 he acheived a 2600+ rating and became a GM. His first elite tournament, in 2008 was the Aeroflot Open. The winner of that event got a spot in the Dortmund Sparkassen Tournament. Nepo won. At that event, he and one other player put the highest bill they had into the vending machine so that a rush of coins would erupt from the change door as they shouted "jackpot". At Dortmund he got his first chance to play some of the best players in the world at the time including GMs Kramnik, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Vassily Ivanchuk, and Peter Leko. He did not lose a single game in the event and tied for second.

Why was Nepo recognized so little at the time even though he was so strong? It could be computer games. He was on of the most famous Russian Dota(a computer game) players. He played on the TR cybersport team that won AUSUS Cup Winter Event. In 2010 he became the European Chess Champion.

Nepo won the Russian Championship Higher League in 2010. He first played for Russia in the Olympiad as the first board for the 2nd team. Also in 2010 he went to the Russian State Social University (RSSU) in Moscow. He got a degree with honors. At the end of 2010 he won the Russian Championship Superfinal by beating Karjakin who was also at RSSU on tiebreaks. In 2011 with a rating of 2733 he played in Tata Steel. At that event he beat Magnus. In 2013, he tied for first at the European Championship and the Russian Higher League, played well at the World Rapid and Blitz Championship, and shared first but lost on tiebreaks at the Russian Championship Superfinal. The World Cup, a chance for the Canidates was a disaster. In 2014 he came 2nd at the World Blitz. In 2015 Nepo won the Aeroflot Open. He did better in the World Cup but still did not win. In 2016 he won the Hainan Danzhou tournament and the Tal Memorial. In 2017 he continued to try to get to the Canidates and played in the World Cup and the FIDE Grand Prix series, coming 9th in the Grand Prix and again not winning the World Cup but doing fine. Nepo won the Gideon Japhet Memorial in Jerusalem and the Dortmund Sparkassen tournament, ahead of Kramnik who had won 10 times. Soon after Kramnik withdrew from professional chess leaving Nepo as the best Russian player. He won both the World and European Team Chess Championships on the Russian Team. He played on the 2016 and 2018 Olympiad Teams for Russia, getting 3rd both times.

He lost to Magnus in the World Chess Championship. He won the Canidates in 2022 and qualifed for the ongoing World Chess Championship.

Who Ding Liren is: 

Ding Liren was born on October 24, 1992 in Wenzhou, China.
 

In 1996, He was enrolled in a chess club, after a match had been played in Wenzhou between Viktor Korchnoi and Xie Jun, the women's world chess champion, which prompted China to proclaim Wenzhou "The City of Chess." Ding Liren was very successful as a child, winning the junior chess championship for China which is called Li Chengzi Cup. In 2003 he tied for first place in the U-10 World Chess Championship. He did it again in the U-12 World Championship in 2004. in May 2009, he won the Chinese Chess Championship, making him the youngest champion ever. The field included Hou Yifan, Wang Hao, and Bu Xiangzhi. He became a grandmaster there. In August 2009, he played in a friendly match against Russia. At the time he was 16 and Nepo was 19. He lost all 4 games he played against Nepo. On their 13th game almost 10 years later, he won for the first time agianst Nepo. In 2011 and 2012 he won the Chinese Championship again. He was an important member of the 214 winning Chinese Olympiad team.

  In 2018, in the Canidates he finished 4th. However, he was the only player to not lose a single game. in 2019 he tied for first place in the Sinquefield Cup with Magnus Carlsen. In the 2020 Canidates he had to quarantine from his team, and so had to prepare alone. Not surprisingly he did very poorly. 

In the 2022 Canidates he was second. Because Magnus decided not to play, he got to play. That is how he got here.

My prediction:

This will be one of the closest World Chess Championships, but I think that I know who will win.

My prediction is ... drumroll please:

Ian Nepomniachtchi. 

He has had experience playing in the World Chess Championship. He is the one who came first in the Canidates, and two years in a row. Don't quote me on this, but I don't think that that has ever happened. Due to the fact that it took almost ten years for Ding to beat him, and all these other factors, I made this prediction. In the survey of more than 2,500 participants Nepo got a large edge.

Thank you to @Lukegk for making the thumbnail. Thanks for reading my blog, and goodbye for now.