The sixth game for the world title. Carlsen - Nepo
The sixth game for the world championship match between our reigning champion Magnus Carlsen of Norway and Russian challenger Yan Nepomniachtit was decided in the sixth game played by both grandmasters in Dubai, December 2021. Which was initially proposed to be held at the end of 2019, but due to the global pandemic generated by covid-19 it was postponed to the end of 2020, which awarded a prize purse of 2,000,000 euros between the two players.
Magnus revalidated the title he has held since 2013, when he managed to snatch it from Indian Viswanathan Anand whom he defeated in their first meeting with the score of 6.5 to 3.5, and against whom he confirmed his supremacy in November 2014, after the Indian player won the Candidates Tournament. Carlsen conquered a favorable score of 6.5 vs 4.5. In 2016 he also took top honors against Russian player Sergei Karjakin, who put up a stiff resistance of 10 draws and 1 win each, thus taking the fight to a rapid game phase where Carlsen imposed his skill against the Russian challenger. London was the scene for the dispute of the world championship 2018 his rival was this time the Italian-American Fabiano Caruana and was again settled in rapid chess games, as the same left the tastelessness of 12 drawn games, again Carlsen took the glory by knocking out his rival with 3 wins to 0 in the playoff.
Today we will comment on what may have been the longest game contested for a world title, because yes, the sixth game for the title held in December 2021 lasted 136 moves and almost 8 hours of fighting, where both contenders had clear opportunities, before the first time control on move 40, in a complex ending Carlsen neutralized the potential threat of his opponent to create a passed pawn and make a couple of key changes that left Nepo alone with his queen and no greater prospects of victory, in an apparently equal endgame according to the computers and endgame tables. But Carlsen kept up the pressure to finally win after an inaccuracy by his opponent on move 130. This high psychological volition of the Norwegian is what has marked his supremacy over a homogeneous group of grandmasters who have a game as precise as that of machines, characteristic of the chess of the third millennium.
A very instructive intricate fight with very few inaccuracies on the part of both players, which gives us to understand that chess has evolved and is on its way to the excellency and that leads us to ask ourselves the following question: Is a game without errors possible and what should be its result, this is a question that has circled in the minds of many of us. Most would dare to say that the result should be a draw, others would say that White should win because of the advantage of being the one who starts the fight. In this regard I can comment that I have been a great fan of correspondence chess in the last 10 years, time in which I have been able to observe how every day the modules and humans have been purified and more technified their game, being generally a superior strategy leading to victory
This sixth game was the Norwegian's first victory and played a very important psychological role in the rest of the match.
In our next installment we will move to the summer of Reskjavik 1972, in the middle of the cold war, where political tensions would also reach the chessboard, in the shocking "match of the century" starring the American Robert James Fischer, better known as "Bobby" Fischer and the Soviet Boris Spassky. And we will also give special emphasis to the sixth game for the world title between these two great talents.
Nicola Nigro Monasterios
FIDE Instructor.
