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This Chess Player Deserves To Become World Champion
Fabiano Caruana (Gonzalez, N.D) https://www.maestrodeajedrez.com/fabiano-caruana/

This Chess Player Deserves To Become World Champion

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Cosmic_Pikachu
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The title of classical world champion is the greatest prestige in all of chess, synonymous with being the best player of the era. To become world champion, one must show a high level of competence to claim a spot in the eight player candidates tournament. This can done by showing excellent performances, rating, and more to prove your strength. The candidates is a bloodbath, usually between players in the top 15 of the world, where players compete in a double round robin and exhibit extraordinary chess in order to take the next step to becoming world champion. After a single victor of the candidates is crowned, they have the opportunity to play the reigning world champion in a best of 14 match. If the world champion wins, they become the defending champion, whereas if the challenger wins, they become the new world champion.

Curiously enough, there are several instances of world champion-material players never being able to obtain the ultimate prestige. The world championships occurs every few years, and the timeframe a player is in the competition is usually when they are between 18 and 36. This means that in some instances, elite players are unfortunate enough to never become world champion. Frequent reasons include poor performances during the candidates (the most important tournament if one hopes to become world champion), and complete domination by the current world champion, preventing challengers from achieving the grand title. Of these players, Viktor Korchnoi, Levon Aronian and Vasyl Ivanchuk are notable examples. In recent times however, one name has emerged in most people's lists as the strongest player to never become world champion. As you probably already guessed, this player is Fabiano Caruana.

Fabiano Caruana is known for being a decorated player with an exquisite positional style supported by a sound dynamic understanding, depthful calculation and bulletproof opening preparation. To briefly summarise Fabiano Caruana's childhood, he was raised in New York by Italian-American parents, until he moved to Europe at the age of 12. It was then that he began to gain attention as a child prodigy in chess. Two years later, he obtained the grandmaster title and won the Italian Chess Championship (the first of four). At the age of 23, he began to represent the United States (previously representing Italy) and a year later, won the US state championship (the first of five). Fabiano has played in no less than five candidates tournaments, yet he either dropped his performance, or in one instance, won, but succumbed to Magnus Carlsen's dominance in the world championship match. To this day, Fabiano is still one of the world's best players (third in classical ratings at the moment) and is 33 years old, meaning he still has hopes of becoming world champion. 

2014 Sinquefield Cup

The 2014 Sinquefield Cup was one of the most dominant displays in elite chess history. Fabiano finished on 8.5/10, including starting on 7/7 against a stacked field. To the untrained eye, this doesn't seem that impressive, but in modern chess, it is nearly impossible to achieve such a feat due to the tremendous quality of chess and difficulty to win with the black pieces. Personally, I have never even seen a player win more than 3 classical games in a row in a tournament against players with an average rating of 2750+. He also demonstrated an approximate 3100 performance rating, sending chills down the spines of the entire chess community. 

(Chess.com, 2014) Visit https://www.chess.com/events/2014-sinq/results for the tournament details
(Chess.com, 2014)Visit https://www.chess.com/events/2014-sinq/results for the tournament details

During the first round, Fabiano Caruana creates winning chances with the black pieces against an opening notorious for being boring and drawish to win a very comfortable game.

In round 2, Fabiano played a very complicated game where he out-prepared his opponent in a very sharp line of the caro-kann, demonstrated opening novelties where even the silicon monster at a low depth is unable to understand, and displayed a superior dynamic understanding to secure victory.
His next opponent was Magnus Carlsen, who was around the 'peak of his powers'. Fabiano is able to gain an opening advantage, more or less forcing Magnus to sacrifice a piece to gain an 'initiative'. Fabiano defends perfectly to completely neutralise Magnus' attack, winning very convincingly and (might I add) easily against the world champion.
At this point, his next opponent Levon senses the incoming onslaught that is Fabiano. Levon is an uncompromising player known for his skill in dynamic chess. However, Fabiano plays an extraordinary positional game, leaving Levon to defend a cramped position with no counterplay, where he is able to make the most of small positional advantages to move onto 4/4.
In round 5, Fabiano plays Hikaru Nakamura. Hikaru's playstyle is characterised by playing very fast and posing practical problems for his opponents, and capitalising on tactical blunders. Fabiano takes advantage of Hikaru's provocative opening choice to obtain a superior position, material gain, and force resignation.
With the win in round 5, Fabiano defeats all players in the tournament. He now has to play Veselin Topalov for a second time. Veselin incorporates a provocative opening strategy where he leaves his king in the centre and tries to gain space in the kingside with his pawns. However, Fabiano plays perfectly to punish and promptly destroy his opponent.

In the final game of Fabiano's legendary streak, he plays Maxime again. His opponent plays a provocative system in an otherwise safe opening to bait black into taking risk. However, Fabiano quickly equalises and Maxime crumbles under the pressure.
In round 8, Fabiano's incredible run is halted by none other than Magnus Carlsen. However, the fact that he was able to begin a tournament containing six of the most elite players on 7/7 is widely regarded as the greatest win streak in the entire history of the game. 
If you have read up to this point (which I know you haven't, but it's OK), you are probably wondering why I am using a tournament from 2014 as the main piece of evidence that this player should be a world champion. In the introduction, I stated that the world champion title is a symbol of domination over all other competitors, which this run demonstrates. Fabiano has maintained a stable place among the world's greatest players, remaining at 2800, winning the 2018 candidates and being undefeated in his classical world championship match against Carlsen. Hopefully, 2026 will be the year for this exciting player, and he adds the world champion title to his already decorated career.