2018 World Championship: Games 1 & 2 - Is Black the New White?
Watching the opening two rounds of the much anticipated World Championship match felt as if it happened through a looking glass. What may have been expected from these games had to be left behind as one theme ruled the weekend: Black is better!
The ceremonial first move was made by actor Woody Harrelson. Credit
No, I don’t really mean that. But perhaps the main surprise from the first two games was that Black seemed to be getting the upper-hand. In Game 1, Caruana started with 1.e4 after a small scare when the actor Woody Harrelson mistakenly played 1.d4 for him.
Of course, one would expect the nice and solid 1...e5 from Carlsen, the move he has basically used his entire career. But no! He played 1...c5, and they quickly entered a Rossolimo Sicilian.
Despite being White, Caruana never seemed to have an advantage that game, barely even an opening one. However Carlsen failed to convert, so who had the psychological advantage from this result? I would still say Carlsen had a slight one, since he was never in trouble and was making Caruana sweat the whole time. But then Game 2 happened.
The start of Game 2. Credit: Mike Klein
Again, Black was the one calling the shots during the game, not necessarily gaining an advantage this time but White had to be careful. One might have expected Caruana to not be playing so well after the first game, maybe due to a shaken confidence and/or all the other pressures of the match. However, just the opposite seems to be true.
Yes, I know this is after Game 3, but I really wanted to use it. Please forgive me!
A confident and comfortable challenger to Carlsen in the World Championship match? This just might be the end to his reign. At least that was my first thought after watching that clip.
Will it be true? Will Carlsen be able to pose any more significant problems to his challenger? Find out next time when I cover games three and four! Be sure to follow me here to receive notifications of new articles, as well as on my other socials to keep up to date with the match and more! Links are on my profile page. Until next time, study and play chess!
