Magnus Carlsen, the world champion, scored another tournament victory this week in the Grenke Classic at Baden-Baden, Germany, but it could hardly have been closer.
Carlsen tied with the German No1, Arkadij Naiditsch, who won their individual game and had also beaten the Norwegian at the 2014 Tromso Olympiad. The pair both scored 4.5/7 and the rules decreed a play-off. They won one each at 15-minute rapid, then drew twice at five-minute blitz, so invoking an Armageddon game where Carlsen as White had six minutes on the clock plus two seconds per move increment, Naiditsch five plus two, and a draw counted as a win for Black.
These terms were more favourable to Carlsen compared with the normal Armageddon five v four minutes with no increment, and he rose to the challenge with a clever idea. His 15 Qxa6 gave him bishop and two pawns for rook with good light square play in an unbalanced position and Naiditsch’s brave resistance finally cracked. He could have kept in the game by 22...g6 but fatally exposed his king, which Carlsen battered round the board into defeat.
Carlsen could have saved a lot of energy and stress had he converted a winning chance against France’s Etienne Bacrot in the final round but equally Fabiano Caruana could have joined the play-off but for missing the rather simple win in this week’s puzzle.
Final leading scores were Carlsen and Naiditsch 4.5/7, Caruana and Michael Adams 4, with India’s former world champion Vishy Anand the big loser, seventh out of eight on 2.5. For Carlsen the result continued a pattern where he plays much of a tournament in the style of a great champion but has the odd blemish when he drops points by miscalculation or over-optimism. When will he totally dominate an event in the style of Bobby Fischer or Garry Kasparov at his peak?
Naiditsch, only No32 in the rankings, reserves his best results for home soil. Adams did well. The England No1 was ground slowly to what could have been a demoralising defeat by Carlsen in round two but then showed resilience to recover completely. At 43 Adams is still in the world’s top 20 and close to his best.
This weekend the tournament circuit moves to Zurich, where Caruana is the top seed and the Russians Vlad Kramnik and Sergey Karjakin reappear. As ever the games are free and live online, with grandmaster and computer move-by-move commentary starting at 2pm, and are recommended viewing.
Magnus Carlsen v Arkadij Naiditsch
1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 a6 6 g3 e5 7 Nde2 Be7 8 Bg2 O-O 9 O-O Nbd7 10 a4 b6 11 Nd5 Nxd5 12 Qxd5 Rb8 13 Nc3 Nf6 14 Qd3 Be6?! 15 Qxa6! Qc7 16 Qe2 Bc4 17 Qf3 Bxf1 18 Bxf1 d5 19 exd5 e4 20 Qf5 Rbd8 21 Bf4 Qc5 22 Rd1 Qb4 23 Be5 Bc5? 24 Bxf6 gxf6 25 Nxe4 Qxb2 26 Bd3 Rfe8 27 Nxf6+ Kf8 28 Nxh7+ Ke7 29 Re1+ Kd6 30 Qf4+ Kxd5 31 Nf6+ Kc6 32 Nxe8 1-0
3377 1...Kd4! 2 Kxe6 Kd3! 3 Nf3 Ke3 4 Ng5 (4 Nh2 Kf2 traps the knight) f3 5 Nxf3 Kxf3 and Black easily wins the pawn race.
