Magnus Carlsen, the world champion, will face five opponents aged 21 or younger when he bids for a record eighth victory at Tata Steel Wijk aan Zee in January. The traditional Dutch tournament at the small windswept North Sea town is by general consensus the best all-play-all annual event on the chess calendar and the invited entry for its 2020 version is bold and imaginative.
Fabiano Caruana, the world No 2, and Wesley So, who crushed Carlsen 13.5-2.5 at Fischer Random earlier this month, are in the field, but many dedicated fans will be watching Alireza Firouzja, who at 16 is receiving rave reviews comparing the Iranian teen to the legendary attacking genius Mikhail Tal. Jeffery Xiong, 19, the No 1 US junior, also has a breakthrough opportunity.
For Carlsen, the fifth round at Wijk, which will be played on tour at Eindhoven, could be the day when he sets a world record for the longest run of classical games without defeat. The Norwegian thought he had reached his target when he surpassed Ding Liren’s 100 mark but then there was publicity for the Russian-Dutch GM Sergey Tiviakov’s 110 against weaker opposition. So Carlsen still needs to stay unbeaten in four games at the Grand Tour final at London Olympia on 2-8 December and his first five rounds at Wijk.
Alexander Grischuk is almost sure to qualify for the 2020 candidates in Ekaterinburg after the Russian won a filigree B v N ending to defeat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the Grand Prix semi-final in Hamburg. Grischuk joins Caruana (2018 challenger), Ding Liren and Teimour Radjabov (World Cup), Wang Hao (Isle of Man) and Anish Giri (rating). One more Grand Prix place will be decided by the final leg in Jerusalem next month, while the organisers have announced that the wildcard will be a Russian.
Levon Aronian was in danger of becoming the forgotten man of the elite when the Armenian failed to qualify for the candidates, but he bounced back at the Bucharest leg of the Grand Tour, defeating Sergey Karjakin in a blitz tie-break.
Aronian thus boosted his chances of qualifying for the Grand Tour semi-final and final at London Olympia, for which tickets are available online. Carlsen is already qualified, but the other three places will go down to the wire at Kolkata in India on 22-26 November.
Earlier, Karjakin got lucky in a frenetic time scramble with Anton Korobov where the Ukrainian missed a forced win in this week’s puzzle diagram.
David Howell played the longest game ever by an Englishman, and the fourth longest in chess history, when he drew in 236 moves with India’s No 2, Pentala Harikrishna, at the European Club Cup in Montenegro.
The top UK clubs did not enter, but three of England’s world team silver medallists are there. Michael Adams and Gawain Jones play for the No 4 seeds, Padova of Italy, and Howell for the No 8 seeds, Valerenga of Norway.
There was success in the opening round of the over-50 world seniors in Bucharest for two English amateurs against GMs rated hundreds of points higher. Dorset’s Kevin Goater won in fine style against Semen Dvoirys while Yorkshire’s Peter Gayson beat the No 2 seed, Darcy Lima.
In 2002 Karjakin became the youngest ever GM at 12 years 7 months, and his record has become an Everest for outstanding pre-teen talents, the equivalent of the world crown for elite GMs. Until now it has survived all attempts, the latest from the Indian prodigies Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa and Dommaraju Gukesh, who both got within a game or two of breaking it.
Abhimanyu Mishra, 10, of New Jersey, US, has just become the youngest ever international master, beating the record set by Praggnanandhaa in 2016.
In October 2018, Fide ratings for players born in 2009 showed Mishra as No 1 at 2149 and England’s Shreyas Royal close behind as No 2 at 2114, but the American’s rating has since surged 250 points in just over a year.
Mishra still has almost two years to break Karjakin’s grandmaster age record. Whereas the Indian pair often had to travel to Europe for GM norm tournaments, Mishra will have ample opportunities at home, together with support from the Kasparov Chess Foundation and its boss.
There are free live games to watch online this weekend at the World Seniors, the Euro Club Cup, and the Grischuk v Jan-Krzysztof Duda Grand Prix final in Hamburg.
3645 1...Rh1+! If 2 Kxh1 Qe4+ and Qg2 mate. If 2 Kf2 Qb2+ 3 Re2 Rh2+ 4 Kg1 Rg2+ and wins.
