Carlsen Reaches Chessable Masters Final
GM Magnus Carlsen beat GM Ding Liren 2-0 to reach the Chessable Masters final. In the other semifinal, GM Ian Nepomniachtchi leveled the score vs. GM Anish Giri and secured a third match on Thursday.
The games of the Chessable Masters can be found here as part of our live events platform. GM Aryan Tari, IM Levy Rozman, WGM Qiyu Zhou, and IM Aleksandr Ostrovskiy are providing daily commentary on Hikaru Nakamura's Twitch channel, embedded on Chess.com/TV.
Carlsen's convincing 2-0 win over Ding was excellent, of course, but one cannot help thinking about the Chinese GM's internet troubles and wonder to what extent it influences his play. Is he distracted by the always-looming possibility of an outage? In other words, is the threat stronger than the execution?
Ding sadly blundered heavily once again in the first game on Wednesday, which put a heavy burden on a match he needed to win. Games like these make us want to see over-the-board chess again.
(Luckily there was something to enjoy as well, such as Carlsen playing the King's Indian—like GM Hikaru Nakamura had done against the same opponent with less success a few days ago—and finding a very pretty, positional pawn sacrifice.)
After a draw in game two, Ding really played below his normal standard in the third encounter, which means he was no match for a Carlsen in fine form:
We'll have more chess on Thursday since Nepomniachtchi managed to reach a third match vs. Giri, who couldn't continue his excellent chess from the past few days.
Nepomniachtchi was too solid as Black with the Semi-Tarrasch Defense and won his first white game, basically straight out of the opening. It was Giri's first loss in the event.
Giri did get a big chance to level the score in game three in a rook endgame but missed it:
Giri and Nepomniachtchi will now play a third match on Thursday starting at 7 a.m. Pacific time / 16:00 Central Europe for a place in the final against Carlsen.
Games SF Day 2
The Chessable Masters runs June 20-July 5 on chess24 as part of the Magnus Carlsen Tour. The prize fund is $150,000 with the first prize of $45,000. The time control is 15 minutes for all moves with a 10-second increment after each move. No draw offers are allowed before move 40.
Previous reports:
- Chessable Masters: Carlsen, Giri Start With Wins As World Champ Gifts Back Point
- Chessable Masters: Ding Beats Nakamura To Set Up Clash With Carlsen
- Chessable Masters: Giri In Semis, Nakamura Forces 3rd Match
- Carlsen, Nepomniachtchi In Chessable Masters Semifinals
- Chessable Masters: How To Win Without Winning?
- Chessable Masters: Nakamura Knocks Out Dubov
- Giri, Vachier-Lagrave Lead Chessable Masters B Group
- Strong Start For Artemiev At Chessable Masters
