FIDE Chess World Cup: Perfect Prep Prevents Poignant Play

Two cases of successful preparation led to quick draws on Monday in both Teimour Radjabov vs. Ding Liren, who started their FIDE World Cup final, and Yu Yangyi vs. Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, who are playing a match for third place.

You can follow the games here as part of our live portal Chess.com/events. There is daily coverage by our Twitch partner, the Chessbrahs.

GMs Yasser Seirawan, Eric Hansen and Aman Hambleton are covering the tournament each day on their channel Twitch.tv/Chessbrah. Play starts at 3 p.m. local time, which is 12:00 (noon) CEST, 6 a.m. Eastern and 3 a.m. Pacific.

Even the biggest lovers of opening theory will not have enjoyed the first day of the World Cup finals too much. Both games followed home analysis of the players for quite some time, and in both cases there was nothing new under the sun: Black is OK in both the Marshall endgame and the Russian System of the Gruenfeld.

Radjabov and Ding repeated their game from the 2019 Gashimov Memorial in early April for no fewer than 27 moves. Back then, Radjabov had followed one of his own games (against Levon Aronian, in 2015) also for 27 moves and failed to get anything significant after deviating. Today he tried even less hard.

"I prepared some line actually before the game. I didn’t like it and decided to call it a day. Just a normal day for me," Radjabov said.

"I didn’t expect he would go for this line again at all. But 27.a4 is not such a serious try," said Ding.

FIDE's interview with Radjabov and Ding.

In the first game of their match for third place, Yu and Vachier-Lagrave played out a similar battle of memory. In a Gruenfeld, the Chinese GM chose the Russian System, which involves playing the queen to b3 on move five.

In the big tabiya of this opening, after White's seventh move, Black has several respectable systems. Vachier-Lagrave chose 7...Nc6, which is doing well theoretically at the moment. In the last encounter at the highest level, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov scored an easy draw against Anish Giri in Wijk aan Zee this year.

At top level it was just waiting before someone would play Yu's novelty on move 15, the natural 15.e5. MVL must have had it in his laptop. He replied after just two minutes of thinking; he only really went into the tank 11(!) moves later. His homework had paid off.

So how long was Vachier-Lagrave's preparation?

"Until this two rooks against rook, bishop and knight," he said, "which is a bit unpleasant for me. But the good thing for me is I basically played 25 moves in five minutes, and then I have 15 moves to make with a lot of time to be accurate and to avoid troubles."

FIDE's interview with MVL and Yu.

The final consists of four classical games and only then, if needed, a tiebreak. The winner will earn $110,000; the runner-up, $80,000. The winner in the match for third place will earn $60,000; the loser gets $50,000.

FIDE World Cup | Finals, Day 1 Results

(Click on image for larger version.)

The FIDE World Cup takes place Sept. 9-Oct. 4 in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. Each round consists of two classical games and a tiebreak on the third day. The final consists of four classical games. Both finalists will qualify for the 2020 Candidates' Tournament. The total prize fund is $1.6 million (1.45 million euros). Sept. 19 and 29 are rest days. You can find more background info in our preview article.

Previous reports:

• 7 Questions About The 2019 FIDE Chess World Cup
• 2019 FIDE Chess World Cup: 4 Upsets On 1st Day
• Navara, Naiditsch, Ponomariov, Wojtaszek Early Victims At FIDE Chess World Cup
• Adams, Bu, Shankland Eliminated In FIDE Chess World Cup Round 1 Tiebreaks
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Nakamura Loses In Round With Special Endgames
• Nakamura Eliminated From FIDE Chess World Cup
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Giri Through In Armageddon
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Karjakin, Harikrishna In Trouble
• FIDE Chess World Cup Ends For Karjakin, Harikrishna
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Xiong Sends Giri Home
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Dominguez, So, Svidler, Xiong Start With Losses
• Nepomniachtchi, So, Svidler Eliminated From FIDE Chess World Cup
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Xiong Knocks Out Duda; Radjabov Eliminates Mamedyarov
• FIDE Chess World Cup Quarterfinals Start Peacefully
• Ding, Radjabov Reach FIDE Chess World Cup Semifinals
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Dramatic Exits For Aronian, Vitiugov As MVL, Yu Advance
• FIDE Chess World Cup Semifinals Start With Draws
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Radjabov Knocks Out MVL, Qualifies For Candidates
• FIDE Chess World Cup: Ding Liren Reaches Final, Qualifies For Candidates