Aronian, Ding Liren, Ivanchuk Through To Quarterfinals

Levon Aronian, Ding Liren and Vassily Ivanchuk have qualified for the quarterfinals of the FIDE World Cup. Ivanchuk had a winning position but forced a draw vs Anish Giri, Ding Liren slowly ground down compatriot Wang Hao and Aronian won a difficult ending vs Daniil Dubov after 97 moves.

Levon Aronian wasn't sure his endgame was winning, but he pulled it off anyway. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

Three of the eight matches in the round of 16 were decided after two days. Aronian, Ding and Ivanchuk can enjoy a well-deserved rest day and maybe watch the tiebreaks in the other five matches. 

Aronian and Ivanchuk are in fact paired against each other for the next round. Ding plays the winner of Najer-Rapport.

2017 World Cup | Round 4 Results

After their fantastic battle in the first game, Alexander Grischuk and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave had enough of it and agreed to a draw as early as move 13. That happened after Grischuk spent an hour over his moves 11, 12 and 13 so apparently he wasn't feeling so confident anymore.

Grischuk gave it a bit of a think, but then the early draw offer came. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

Around the same time Bu Xiangzhi and Peter Svidler drew, after the latter equalized without problems. They played 17 moves. So these four players go to tiebreaks, and the winners will face each other in the quarterfinals.

"Who is going to pick the color for the first rapid game?" "Let him!" "No, let him!" | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

The draws in Jobava vs So and Najer vs Rapport had a bit more content, with Jobava pressing (again!) and Rapport having an edge for a short while.

Jobava again made an excellent impression today vs So. He is doing so much better than in Leuven! | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

There was one draw that should have been a win, but nonetheless decided the match. Vassily Ivanchuk only needed a draw vs Anish Giri, but got a winning position with the black pieces rather quickly. Everyone expected him to become the first player to win, but then something else happened. Ivanchuk saw a perpetual, and took it.

Where the engines shouted "win for Black!" Ivanchuk saw some danger and took the perpetual. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

"I don't know about my position in the opening, but he missed 35...b4," Ivanchuk told Chess.com. "He defended quite well, and in the end I was quite happy to make a draw with perpetual! In this position I felt it can be dangerous somewhere. His king active, the d5-pawn is strong..."

Chess.com's interview with Ivanchuk.

His second Erwin l'Ami is leaving the same night; Giri will stay in Georgia some more with his family-in-law. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

Despite calling his play in both games "embarrassing," Levon Aronian managed to advance to the next round. Where he missed a win in yesterday's game ("I totally forgot about Ne8"), he "missed" a win 10 times today—but more about that later.

"First of all my opponent played a very suspicious line in the opening and instead of playing very solidly for some reason I decided to play for mate," Aronian said about the first phase. "I blundered a couple of things. First off I forgot that he threatened to exchange queens, and if it wasn't enough, I also blundered 17...f6."

Aronian, who felt he was in trouble, made a practical draw offer that Dubov declined by making a mistake. According to Aronian Black should have played 19...Rac8 instead of taking the pawn. After 23...g5 24.f4! it was Aronian who declined a draw offer.

Both players offered a draw in this game. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

Eventually he won an exchange, and a complicated endgame appeared on the board with rook-vs-(light-squared) bishop, and g-pawns for both. It was similar to Aronian's blitz game vs David Navara in St. Louis last month, where the pawns were on h4 and h5, when it's a draw (as Navara showed).

For this exact position, Aronian wasn't even sure if it was a win or a draw. As Dejan Bojkov wrote, the complexity of this ending was revealed during the live transmission of the game. Neither commentator GM Ivan Sokolov knew, nor was super GM Vassily Ivanchuk sure about the evaluation. Actually they both guessed it should be a draw!

"I analyzed it a long time ago but I couldn't find the win. It was so embarrassing," said the winner. "Probably people are sitting there with tablebases and laughing at me!"

Dubov resigns after Aronian liquidated to a winning pawn endgame. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

He did have a very plausible explanation for the fact that both he and his opponent made 10 "tablebase errors" in this game. "In this tournament players do not show their best play because there's so much at stake, especially for me as I am trying to qualify for the Candidates', so it's very stressful."

Tired or not, Aronian will always have a smile ready after a win. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

In the background of all this, the soft speaking Ding Liren quietly played a gem of a game. The Chinese player outplayed his compatriot Wang Hao beautifully and won in textbook style. The famous principle "don't rush" (which gets a separate chapter in Mikhail Shereshevsky's classic "Endgame Strategy") especially comes to mind.

"Difficult game," said Ding. "I was pressing throughout. I think I played very well. I am very satisfied with my performance."

Sometimes you need to hide from the world to find the ultimate concentration. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

Maxim Rodshtein did something quite impressive as well: winning a must-win game, with the black pieces, vs Vladimir Fedoseev. His nothing-to-lose strategy seems to have worked: "Of course it's very hard but I didn't really care about playing for the result. I said I will to my best, I will play aggressively and we will see. If I don't manage, which is very likely, then OK, what to do."

Chess.com's interview with Rodshtein.

Rodshtein called his mixture of Queen's and King's Indian "quite bad," but that's also the word he used for describing his opponent's play. "I equalized quite easily, but then I realized I had to take some risks."

The Israeli grandmaster wasn't sure from what point he was winning. "The whole endgame looks quite risky for White."

Maxim Rodshtein briefly analysing with his opponent after scoring the important win. | Photo: Chess.com/Maria Emelianova.

At the end of the day we got confirmation of some good news. So many World Cup participants can be found on the Isle of Man participants list now!

Games from TWIC.

The World Cup takes place September 3-27 in Tbilisi, Georgia. Each round consists of two classical games (four in the final), and possibly a rapid and blitz tiebreak on the third day. The total prize fund is $1.6 million, including a first prize of $120,000. The top two finishers will qualify for the 2018 Candidates' Tournament. 

Chess.com relays the games at Chess.com/Live. You can watch also live commentary on Chess.com/TV provided by the Chessbrahs, which includes some of the best commentators on the planet: GM Eric Hansen, GM Robin van Kampen, GM Yasser Seirawan and IM Aman Hambleton.

Previous reports:

• Ivanchuk, Fedoseev Start Round 4 With Wins
• Caruana, Li Chao, Nepomniachtchi Leave World Cup
• World Cup Shock: Carlsen, Kramnik, Nakamura Out
• Bu Brilliancy Beats Carlsen At World Cup
• Dress Code Incident At World Cup: Kovalyov Forfeits
• Harikrishna, Mamedyarov, Radjabov, Wei Yi, Wojtaszek Exit World Cup
• Favorites Falter: Adams, Anand, Karjakin Knocked Out
• Anand Starts With Loss In World Cup Round 2
• Amin, Howell, Fressinet, Nisipeanu Exit World Cup
• Lenderman Knocks Out Eljanov At World Cup
• Eljanov, Fedoseev, Harikrishna, Wei Yi Upset At World Cup
• Carlsen Draws White For 1st Game World Cup
• FIDE World Cup To Start This Weekend
• Carlsen At The World Cup: 'I Want To Exploit This Loophole'
• Magnus Carlsen To Play FIDE World Cup