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Carlsen Silences Crowd To Beat Nakamura, Books Esports Final Vs. Firouzja
Carlsen silenced the local crowd cheering for Nakamura during a victorious 4th game, though there were twists ahead!

Carlsen Silences Crowd To Beat Nakamura, Books Esports Final Vs. Firouzja

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Colin_McGourty
| 66 | Chess Event Coverage

World number-one Magnus Carlsen will take on GM Alireza Firouzja in the 2025 Esports World Cup Grand Final after defeating GM Hikaru Nakamura 4-3 in an epic match decided only in armageddon. Carlsen had earlier defeated GM Nihal Sarin 2.5-0.5, while Firouzja swept aside GM Arjun Erigaisi 4-1 in the other semifinal. While Carlsen and Firouzja play for $250,000, Nakamura will take on Arjun for the $145,000 third-place prize.

The final day is Friday, August 1, starting at 9 a.m. ET / 15:00 CEST / 6:30 p.m. IST.

Semifinals:

Quarterfinals:

Esports World Cup Chess Bracket

An eight-hour day three saw the Quarterfinals and Semifinals of the Esports World Cup, leaving only the Grand Final and Third Place Match to be played on Friday.

Let's take the day's action in reverse chronological order.

Carlsen and Nakamura met again. Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

Semifinals

Carlsen 4-3 Nakamura

The Esports World Cup Semifinals were best-of-six and the final match of the day saw the world numbers one and two clash for a spot in the Grand Final. Once again it didn't disappoint! 

Carlsen got off to a perfect winning start after what Nakamura called "a very bad game," adding, "I got this slightly worse position and lost." There was a curious moment toward the end, however, with Carlsen suddenly looking shocked after he played 42.Nf3.

He probably thought he'd blundered the f4-pawn, but, as he seemed to soon realize, he'd set an accidental trap!

Nakamura told FM Mike Klein: "After that first game I decided I was going to go all-in. I played great, but it wasn’t good enough!"

After that first game I decided I was going to go all-in. I played great, but it wasn't good enough!

—Hikaru Nakamura 

Game two seemed to be going Carlsen's way, but he lost control toward the end and found himself lost in the final position—only for Nakamura to miss the win and take a draw by repetition instead. It was understandable that the world number-one gave a fist pump! 

Seeing that miss could have been soul-destroying, but instead Nakamura played his old love, the King's Indian Defense, and became the first player to beat Carlsen in the Esports World Cup when he trapped the Norwegian's queen.

The local crowd, supporting the Saudi Team Falcons for which Nakamura plays, cheered on that result.

How did the crowd reaction make Carlsen feel? "It pissed me off when they cheered when Hikaru was winning!"

It pissed me off when they cheered when Hikaru was winning!

—Magnus Carlsen on the crowd reaction

Carlsen vs. Nakamura was the most anticipated match of the day. Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

He got to channel that frustration in the very next game, where he put his finger to his lips when he played 34...a4! and knew he was winning.

Carlsen was back in the lead, and the fifth game was the only quiet draw of the match. That meant Nakamura had to win on demand in the sixth game, but instead he fell into a much worse position. Carlsen let some of his advantage slip, but was never worse than equal... until he blundered a piece in one move! He'd missed one of those dreaded backward knight moves.

The crowd wasn't silenced but broke out in applause!

Nakamura had earlier talked about how the secret to winning armageddon games was to get the black pieces, and he showed how great his desire was by bidding only six minutes and 12 seconds.

That was a huge time deficit to Carlsen's 10 minutes, but Nakamura only needed a draw, and came very close. He later summed up: "I had a great position in this game. If I had played [28...]Bxa4 instead of Rxa4 i think I probably would be going to the final, so it’s very disheartening, but that’s how it goes."

Carlsen admitted: "I was so nervous in the last game. I kind of knew what moves to play to some extent but I was still shaking. This was really tough!" Everything turned, however, on another one-move blunder, this time by Nakamura. There was no way back.

That final clash is our Game of the Day, which GM Rafael Leitao analyzes below.

Carlsen has won a $250,000 top prize in Riyadh before, when he won the 2017 World Blitz Championship, and he'll be looking to do it again in Friday's final against Firouzja, Nakamura's Team Falcons teammate. Both players were in the mood for some trashtalking! 

Here's Nakamura's recap of the day's action:

Firouzja, meanwhile, faced less drama in the Semifinals.

Firouzja 4-1 Arjun

The first two games had a huge influence on this match. "Game one he played well and I lost," conceded Arjun, which is true, though it's noteworthy that if he'd moved his king in a different direction at the end (50...Kc4! instead of 50...Ke3?) it was still possible to escape with an unlikely draw. 

In the second game, meanwhile, Arjun brought sharp opening prep to the table, won a piece, and was close to sealing a comeback. "If I had hit back it would have helped me with my confidence and helped me play better in game three," said the Indian star, but it wasn't to be.

Firouzja got to do a lot of key crushing! Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

He confessed: "I have only myself to blame because I was so winning and I also had a lot of time. I just rushed with this sequence where he took on a2." Arjun had missed a final move that meant he had nothing but a draw.

The rest proved easy for Firouzja, who won games three and five to cruise into the final. 

It was a long day in Riyadh, with the action starting earlier with the best-of-four Quarterfinals.

Quarterfinals

Carlsen 2.5-0.5 Nihal

"Of course I just got completely crushed today," was Nihal's summary of the quarterfinal match against Carlsen, but both players agreed that for 1.5 games it was too close to call. Carlsen admitted of the first game, "he outcalculated me in the opening and I was a pawn down, and I was kind of just hoping to survive and maybe then play on the clock." That plan almost worked out, except that with two minutes more at the end the world number-one stumbled into a draw by repetition.

Nihal said he was happy to get to play a match against his idol. Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

The second game featured Nihal correctly rejecting an offer to make an early draw, since he was better, but then his first long think of the game produced the single bad move, 28.Nd5?, and after 28...Bxd5 29.Bxd5 e4! Carlsen was better and never game any second chances.  

That meant Carlsen could clinch the match in game three, and he did, with everything going his way. He commented: "It’s the kind of position which I like a lot, where you just have relatively simple play and it’s safe and that went pretty nicely." 27.Bxa6! was a winning blow that Arjun had seen but underestimated.

Nihal, representing Team S8UL, still took $85,000, as did the remaining three players to lose in the Quarterfinals.

Nakamura 2.5-1.5 Aronian

This was a thriller of a match, with Nakamura getting revenge for the match he lost 2.5-1.5 to GM Levon Aronian recently in Las Vegas. Nakamura pointed out it wasn't his only revenge in Riyadh:

There was the match against Sindarov, which basically I felt like was the world righting things for a match that I never should have lost in February, and to be frank, this match against Levon in Vegas I should have won that match probably 95 percent of the time considering the position I had in the second game of the match, so it feels like the world righting things, winning the match here. Actually I prefer winning here over winning in Vegas, so I’m pretty happy!

Actually I prefer winning here over winning in Vegas, so I'm pretty happy! 

—Hikaru Nakamura on beating Aronian

Levon Aronian was suddenly out just when he thought he was doing fine. Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

The first game was madness, since Nakamura, with a big advantage on the board and on the clock, decided to win on the clock, only to blunder his rook—and then survive since Aronian didn't have time to deliver checkmate.

"I think we were both a little bit on tilt from the first game" said Nakamura about the second game which he won after Aronian blundered last.

In the third, however, Aronian hit back, with 26.e6+!, opening up the g6-square for a knight fork, winning on the spot.

The final game was fittingly dramatic, with Aronian summarizing, "Just when I thought everything was going my way, I blundered mate-in-one!"

Nakamura confessed he hadn't initially spotted the detail either, but he saw it in time to play the match-winning 26.Qh6+!.

Aronian's best explanation was, "There is so much tension with the flagging business that sometimes when there is no danger of flagging you just lose concentration!"

It was the end of a hugely successful road for Aronian in recent events, but when asked about the secret of his success he quoted the words of GM Boris Gelfand: "It’s all about coming there and doing what you’re supposed to do and having no expectations."

It's all about coming there and doing what you're supposed to do and having no expectations.

—Boris Gelfand on how to approach chess tournaments

Aronian hadn't disappointed his Japanese Team Reject. 

Firouzja 3-1 Abdusattorov

Firouzja largely dominated the first two games of this quarterfinal match, but GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov put up great resistance and even had winning chances of his own in the second game.

Firouzja and Abdusattorov took to the stage. Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

In the third, however, the dam burst, as Firouzja did something that surprisingly few managed—flagged his opponent! 

That wasn't the end of the story, however, with Abdusattorov looking on course to get revenge by flagging Firouzja in the final game to force armageddon... until the Uzbek star blundered a rook. The clock still meant the game was anyone's to win, but the Iranian-born French star was ruthless as he spotted a checkmate tactic to seal victory.

It was all over for Abdusattorov and Team NAVI.

Arjun 2.5-1.5 Nepomniachtchi

GM Anish Giri had noted in the preshow that GM Ian Nepomniachtchi, as an at one time semi-professional Dota player, was more at home in Riyadh than any of the other chess players. The Aurora Gaming player, however, saw his stay cut short by Arjun, who started well, winning a pawn early on in the first two games and converting in the second game.

Arjun Erigaisi knocked out Ian Nepomniachtchi. Photo: 2025 Esports World Cup.

The third game, however, Arjun called "a disaster," explaining, "I think the fact that I was up in the match affected me in the sense that I was unable to decide if I should play safe or play it normally, and in the process I ended up playing passively and it cost me." 30...bxc3! was a nice final blow by Nepomniachtchi.  

The scores were level going into the final game, but once again it was Black who triumphed, with Arjun taking the match with some neat tactics. Nepomniachtchi's frustration was obvious.

Arjun's teammates had plenty to celebrate.

As we saw, Arjun would go on to lose in the Semifinals, but he still takes on Nakamura for a far from shabby $145,000 in the third-place match. All eyes, however, will be on Carlsen vs. Firouzja, Team Liquid vs. Team Falcons, for $250,000 and the bragging rights of winning the inaugural chess Esports World Cup.

Don't miss it!  

How to watch?
You can follow the 2025 Esports World Cup games on our Events Page. You can watch live commentary on the Chess.com YouTube and Twitch channels.
GMs David Howell, Maurice Ashley, Ben Finegold, IMs Tania Sachdev, Jovanka Houska, FM Mike Klein, John Sargent, Dash Patterson, Tyler1, and Sandstorm hosted the broadcast for Stream A.
GMs Eric Hansen, Aman Hambleton, Benjamin Bok, WGM Nemo Zhou, and FM James Canty III hosted the broadcast for Stream B.

The 2025 Esports World Cup in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, features chess for the first time, with a $1.5 million prize fund and $250,000 for first place, while chess players are also part of esports teams that share a $27 million prize fund. Twelve players qualified for the main event via the Champions Chess Tour, while four qualified in the Last Chance Qualifier (July 24-26) in Riyadh. The main event (July 29-August 1) is first split into four groups of four players. Half of the players will be eliminated before the top eight compete in a knockout Playoff for the top prizes. The time control for all games is 10 minutes, with no increment.

Previous coverage:

Avatar of Colin_McGourty
Colin McGourty

Colin McGourty led news at Chess24 from its launch until it merged with Chess.com a decade later. An amateur player, he got into chess writing when he set up the website Chess in Translation after previously studying Slavic languages and literature in St. Andrews, Odesa, Oxford, and Krakow.

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