World Cup final 4 & finalists predictions.

Kamsky vs. Karjakin in one semi final. Caruana vs. Nakamura in the other semi final.

I believe Karjakin will win against Kamsky & get one of the two qualifying spots into the world championship candidates tournament. I would like to see Gata win but I just feel he isn't as motivated as he used to be. But this may be his last real chance at seeing how close he can get to the world title shot.

The other semi final is harder to predict. The winner of this semi final will get the other spot in the candidates tournament. My instinct tells me that Hikaru wants it more, but he's just so erratic. Both him & Fabiano are playing very well this tournament. I'm going to predict Caruana wins & faces Karjakin in the final.

Of course this means I believe Kramnik, Grischuk, Svidler, & a crowd of others are going to lose before the semi finals. By the way, here's the bracket :   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_World_Cup_2013

Any predictions?

Morozevich, Svidler, Gelfand, Kramnik.

Svidler-Kramnik.

Kramnik.

Kramnik hasn't played his best chess yet, and will have a hard draw with potentially Ivanchuk and Nakamura but that would be my prediction.

This format is BS; too much is left to chance. Adding Gelfand to the players already mentioned.

Under normal circumstances I would definitely pick Kramnik over the whole field. I think he's better on avaerage than anyone left. The problem is that he already has qualified for the candidates tournament & that's what these 2 finalists get, a spot on the candidates tournament. I'm just thinking there's more hunger, drive, & motivation for the others who probably have more of a sense of urgency about their results, especially since the FIDE Grand Prix is almost finished & it only selects 2 players.

It's a definite factor, but Kramnik plays to win any tournament, and he's a professional, I doubt he will be drastically less motivated.

I'll go for the little piranha Wei Yi.

I agree the matches are way too short. Maybe cut the field down to the top 32 in the world & let 'em play 4 classic games the 1st 2 rounds, Then 6 in the final 8 & final 4. Then maybe 8 in the final. The winner of all that should be the challenger to the world champion. Maybe something like that, definitely more than 2 slow games.

It's definitely fun seeing that little kid go as far as he has. He plays a tie break tomorrow vs. Mamedyarov. I hope he goes even farther (or is it further). I think no matter what his final result in this tournament it has been an awesome performance & I think he's going to come out of this tournament as a new beast full of confidence. I'm very interested to see his very next event after this.

The way things have been going so far, it'll probably be Granda, Kryvoruchko, Dubov and Wei Yi in the final four.

LOL

Actually, they don't play any slow games at all.  The time control is 40 moves in 90 minutes and then 30 minutes + 30 second increment for the rest of the game.  That's probably why we're seeing so many big upsets.

On average the total time for the games are about 5 hours. Some a bit longer, some shorter. Todays last game was over 6.5 hours. That's a lot better than the rapid games.

By the way, It's good to see Granda still playing & getting into the round of 32. But he's going to have his hands full with Anish Giri in tomorrows tie break.

Yeah, I'm thinking those 2 in the final also. I'm predicting Karjakin.

Nakamaura

It would be cool if he won. This is the best chance he's going to get to get a spot into the candidates tournament because he's not going to qualify any other way right now. He better play rock solid though & not so caotic & inconsistent. Naka is only in the top 16 right now, he's gotta make it to the top 2. Also, his girlfriend & stepdad showed up during the 3rd round so I hope they aren't distracting & taking away from his focus on the tournament.

It's impossible to predict with this format. The only thing that is to be expected is that none of the best players will win. My guess for the semifinals is: Mamedyarov, Karjakin, Vachier-Lagrave and Nakamura.