2024 Candidates

Women:

Humpy 1/2 - Zhongyi 1/2 Reversed Grünfeld. Just trading pieces into a draw.

Good Spanish win for Prag. I also think that Nepo is very deserving of another title shot should he prevail in the end. I know they're all really great players & all want to win but I imagine Nepo has the fiery heart of a champion after all he has been through.

Nepo has sole 1st going into the first rest day.

🍎

I'm surprised to see so many 1.e4 games as many tournaments recently have had d4 being played a lot more.

Also, it's refreshing to see the top players going back to the Ruy Lopez, which has a rich history in chess traditions - definitely a change from seeing Londons and Italian games.

In general I'm seeing more tactical and less positional games than I expected, which is always nice to experience at such a high level.

Vidit was completely lost against Ian, there was nothing he could do in that position.

On my patzer level, in most cases, I would probably play one more move, and I would wait for Rxd7 by the opponent to resign, but it was a clear loss by this point in any case. But these are super GMs, Vidit knows this is unsalvageable. So nothing to be done, resignation was the only thing he could do.

Was there a round today?

Wow, I almost said 4 draws today, but now I see that Nakamura somehow won against Firouzja after having an equal position. It seems like an endgame blunder in a time scramble. Gukesh had a winning opportunity against Abasov, but that game looks like a draw now.

And Gukesh wins in the end a queen and pawn vs queen endgame. I presumed wrong.

Nakamura is done! He played badly and his commentary was even worse! He needs to retire! Plus the guy is part of a corrupt group of chess vipers in Westchester County.

Hikaru has played pretty poorly, the worst was Rd3as black when he tried the Slav v Queens Gambit, white went dull option by swapping central pawns and heading for the London Def setup with Nf3 follies by Bf4, you would have thought his seconds would have prepped him a better effort than Nc6-Bd6, he ended up giving up both his bishops and fizzling out a very dull draw, Rd4 was equally none exciting, yes interesting opening but calling the arbiter over to declare a repartition draw on a position with both sides still having two knights, queen each + a rook and equal pawns was not what I expected to see, he needed to win, and the position did offer clear options to play for more!? Two candidates are already on 2 wins to stand any chance he needs to start bring prepared to play out positions to there conclusions or its back to his easy chair and streaming?!!

Alireza is having an awful tournament so far. Yesterday's blunder obviously affected him a lot. Today's game was over pretty fast, he was lost in under 15 moves.

Psychological resiliance (or the lack of it) is a game-changer at that level of play.

That's one reason I'd like to see Nepo do well.

For me he is the main favorite to win this from the start, as he showed already that he does well in this kind of tournament.

I know that most people predicted that Caruana or Nakamura will win, and those are good takes as well, but I think Nepo has to at least be taken as seriously as those two, he won this twice in a row after all.

In any case, a lot of interesting games so far.

There has been plenty of fighting chess!

So lemme get this straight..... Firouzja goes through all that stuff just to get into the Candidates again, at Wesley So's expense, just to be a cellar dweller?

Gukesh is an amazing talent... but I'm not sure he has developed the physical and mental stamina he'll need to take first.

We'll see...

Gukesh is only 17. I bet he looked 35 when he was 8, full beard & mustache too.