Carlsen vs Nepo Classical Games Head to Head
As we are getting close to witnessing a world championship match,
let's review the head-to-head score between Magnus and Nepo.
While they have played online and also in rapid and blitz tournaments ( as per the games I have analyzed on this blog for instance), they have only 5 decisive classical games played in their entire career.
Head to Head Score: Nepomniachtchi 4 - Carlsen 1
The other games were drawn, so I only include decisive games played in classical chess, i.e what will be used for the world championship. Specifically the time control in WCC Dubai 2021 will be
4. 2. Time control
The time control for each game is 120 minutes for the first 40 moves, followed by 60 minutes for the next 20 moves and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game with an increment of 30 seconds per move starting from move 61.
The 2002 game was played in 2002 European championship under 12, a long time ago
The 2003 game was played in the World Under 14 Junior Championship, which incidentally was won by Sergey Zhigalko.
Both games were won by Nepo.
the 2011 game was played in Tata Steel -Wijk Aan Zee tournament, a sicilian Najdorf won by Nepo with the Black pieces.
https://www.chess.com/games/view/13136210
I will focus on the most recent games.
The 2017 game was played in London and Magnus was the reigning world champion. Still Magnus lost that game showing Nepo's style is challenging for him.
And this brings up to the last decisive game, 2019 Zagreb Grand Chess Tour where Magnus won with the black pieces.
a detailed coverage of this game and tournament Zagreb 2019 GCT is here
photos courtesy of chess.com
