Caruana, Wang Hao Lead FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss At Half

The sixth round of the FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss started with seven leaders, but of those just Fabiano Caruana and Wang Hao won their games today. The two are on 5/6 going into the only rest day in Isle of Man.

Tuesday was a good day for the white pieces, as six of the top nine boards were won by White. It was also a bloody day, with 12 decisive games among the top 17 boards.

After a narrow escape in the previous round against Luke McShane, Caruana did much better the next day. The second seed defeated Vladimir Fedoseev convincingly.

"I wasn't particularly proud of that game," Caruana said about the day before. "I just blundered something horribly in the opening [...] and my position got borderline losing and I didn't defend very well. [McShane] was playing well for the most part and then right at the finish line he just failed to put me away."

On Tuesday, Caruana managed to surprise his opponent by going for an old version of the topical Rossolimo Sicilian. "He just wasn't very well prepared for this line, which is very dangerous for Black," he said.

Caruana was referring to his approach with 5.c3, basically the old main line from the 1970s. Taking on c6 is much more common these days.  

Without going into much detail, Caruana suggested that Black should have postponed castling. As it went, White's advantage became bigger and bigger.

Caruana showed his game on the live broadcast.

McShane could have been the sole leader after five rounds, but instead he only got a half-point out of his last two games. On board three, Wang Hao was too strong today.

The Chinese GM joined Caruana in the lead thanks to this excellent game:

World junior champion Parham Maghsoodloo had prepared a surprising line in the Anti-Berlin against Alexander Grischuk, where he allowed a ...Qxf2+ in the opening. White had to put his king on d1, but that was part of the plan. After this promising start the game soon fizzled out:

Magnus Carlsen, just half a point behind the leaders, defeated Alexei Shirov in what was a "decent enough game," as the winner put it. 

In Nikita Vitiugov's footsteps (vs. Wesley So at the World Cup), the world champ quickly got a very pleasant position from a 3.d4 Petroff.

Carlsen was content with provoking Black's ...b6, which got rid of any Qc7-a5 later on. "Then his only counterplay is connected with ...g5 or ...d4 but I don't think any of them really work," he said.

Shirov played ...g5 anyway, on move 17, to which Anish Giri posted on Instagram: "When you play the Petroff but then you remember you're Alexei Shirov." 

When the interviewer Steil-Antoni told Carlsen about Giri's post, the world champion smiled, and then continued explaining: "17...g5 is not really a move you want to play. I think it was born out of some sort of desperation. He felt like he was a bit worse and he wanted to break out. Ultimately it doesn't improve his position at all."

In the remainder, Carlsen felt he played "a bit sloppy," but he never seemed to have lost control.

Carlsen showed his game on the live broadcast

Sergey Karjakin was worse against Yuriy Kryvoruchko and also in quite serious time trouble, but eventually held the draw with a perpetual in a queen endgame where he was two pawns down.

Levon Aronian faced the veteran grandmaster Alexey Dreev. Dreev sacrificed a piece for which he got an octopus on d3, and attacking chances. Just when things started to get really interesting, Dreev miscalculated as he probably missed an intermediate move, and suddenly it was over.

Vitiugov won a great game against Matthias Bluebaum where Vitiugov sacrificed a bishop on f7 in the opening. Vitiugov thought he was winning there, and the players still believed that as they analyzed the game, but the engine spoiled the fun as it pointed out a possible defense for Black.

"Sometimes it's better to be optimistic," remarked Vitiugov.

Vitiugov showed his game on the live broadcast.

After winning two good games in a row, Viswanathan Anand noted that his tournament is improving after his bad start. "I just stopped thinking about it after round one," he said. "Once you make a mistake like that then you play just play game to game and that's it."

The 49-year-old Indian legend was too strong for the 34-years-younger prodigy, Nodirbek Abdusattorov of Uzbekistan.

Anand showed his game on the live broadcast.

After Carlsen and Caruana it was eight-time Russian champion Peter Svidler's turn to put up an Houdini act. Against the five-time Romanian champion Constantin Lupulescu, Svidler was a piece down for two hours and 30 more moves, but eventually held the draw:

Hikaru Nakamura is still in contention as well, after four draws and two wins. In this round he outplayed the Russian grandmaster Alexander Riazantsev:

FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss | Round 6 Standings

1-2: Wang Hao, Caruana 5

3-9: Maghsoodloo, Anton, Carlsen, Grischuk, Vitiugov, Alekseenko, Aronian 4.5

10-23: Adhiban, Fedoseev, Shirov, Jumabayev, McShane, Kovalev, Yu, Karjakin, Wojtaszek, Nakamura, Gelfand, Kryvoruchko, Anand, Hovhannisyan 4

(Full standings here.)

FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss | Top pairings round 7 (Thursday)

Grischuk vs. Caruana
Aronian vs. Wang Hao
Alekseenko vs. Carlsen
Anton vs. Vitiugov
Yu Yangyi vs. Maghsoodloo
Kryvoruchko vs. Anand
Fedoseev vs. Karjakin
Shirov vs. Wojtaszek
Adhiban vs. Nakamura
Jumabayev vs. Gelfand

(Full pairings here.)

Find the top games of round six for replay here:

#IOMchess The answer ⁦@Anna_Chess⁩ of course. Do join us for more live commentary https://t.co/AImbyxJBaI pic.twitter.com/8LKEeMK2I4

— Daniel King (@DanielKingChess) October 15, 2019

Rakesh Kulkarni contributed to this report.

Previous reports:

• FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss Starts Thursday
• FIDE Chess.com Isle Of Man: Round 1 Pairings
• FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss: Najer Upsets Anand In Round 1
• FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss: 5 Players Lead After Round 2
• FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss: Caruana, Wang Hao Still Perfect
• FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss: 4 Players Lead; Carlsen Escapes
• FIDE Chess.com Grand Swiss: 7 Players Lead As Caruana Escapes