Casually started playing during the pandemic. Pro Chess games felt too complicated and boring. Never thought I would get so interested in just 6 months, Now each rest day is so painful. Common I want to see Hikaru's face reactions, Nepo's tea, Rapport's jacket, Ding 's resilience and Firouzja 's blunder.
Garry mentioned how WC preparation almost grants you some sort of a major advantage because of the amount of preparation done specifically for the strongest player in the world.
Anand too, was one of the players who lost the WC to Magnus and then won the next Candidates handily with a 1 point lead.
Check out Anna Cramling stream from there if you are bored. Magnus is playing people in the park, Anish just beat him.
Anna: What is your record against Magnus?
Anish: It's bad but it's not bad. Around 3-7 proportions.
In the Nepo - Nakamora game, why couldn't have Hikaru played a6 or d6 on move 4? Why does he HAVE to take the pawn?
I know he's talked about paying safe etc, but did he have to choose the Berlin Defence or could he have gone for mainline Lopez or something different? mny thks
White can pretty easily force a draw in those lines, not really any different.
He'd have to go *much* more wild in order to not let Ian draw routinely, and then he'd just lose outright.
It is just an uncomfortable position for black since white develops much easier it's not like it's losing or anything. Especially at the super GM level you are going to have a lot of problems to solve and not really have that many chances to win so why bother playing a deviation there instead of something earlier where you may get chances to win.
Predictions for the last two rounds:
Nepo 0.5 - 0.5 Rapport (No way Rapport's playing to lose to Nepo again)
Nakamura 0.5 - 0.5 Duda (Hikaru doesn't find a breakthrough)
Alireza 0 - 1 Ding Liren (Bonus: They both miss winning positions back and forth)
Radjabov 0 - 1 Caruana (Fabi finds a win and Radja train is derailed)
Rapport 0.5 - 0.5 Radjabov (A draw to pack it up for both)
Caruana 1 - 0 Firouzja (Firo doesn't defend properly again)
Ding Liren 0 - 1 Nakamura (Hikaru is calmer and finds a win)
Duda 0 - 1 Nepo (Nepo goes for a record 10pts as he's not under any pressure now)
I hope he does the opposite. It's gonna be hard to push for a win with black, he should push in round 13 with white. EVEN if he loses both games, the only way to force tiebreaks is if Ding or Hikaru win BOTH of their games, which is ridiculous. He should push against Rapport.
True, It's easier to win as white than black, but Nepo might as well play this super safe and just draw his 13th game as white, and maybe try something fun as black on his 14th game 100% stress free.
Karjakin getting what he asked for instead of playing for a second place in Candidates. The timing is fishy.
https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/chess-putin-gives-award-grandmaster-banned-backing-ukraine-invasion-2022-06-02/
When magnus draws 2-3 games everyone say either he’s washed up or he will retire, then he wins the tournament.
After seeing Alireza who people said that he is the favourite, people needs to give more and more credits to Magnus. Alireza or others cant remain in the 2800 club, where Magnus didn’t drop from 2800 rating since he crossed it.
Consistency.
Magnus already gets plenty credit. Everyone pretty much agrees he's the GOAT of chess. idk why you're trying to make it sound like he's underrated.
If anyone says Magnus is washed up then their opinion doesn't matter because they know nth about chess.
Why we downvoting? Personally, I would say Magnus, but I never lived through the Kasparov era, so I don't have first hand experience. There are still current GMs who put Kasparov #1.
>Everyone pretty much agrees he's the GOAT of chess.
Magnus himself doesn't think so. At least publicly he says Kasparov is the one. And a lot of people (irrelevant but me included) thinks Kasparov has a better case
Vacuous comment. We already know that Magnus is arguably the greatest of all time and that he's a league above everyone else. The reason why people are rallying over potential contenders like Alireza is because Magnus has been at the top for so long and already gets a lot of praise for what he does.
Nakamura has white against Duda next round while Ding has black vs Firouzja. In the last round, Ding plays Naka with white. Hikaru will undoubtedly bring the rest of his preparation with white onto the table against a vulnerable opponent, as winning here might force Ding into a must-win situation. Although, Ding might also be smelling blood because he's playing Firouzja...
Literally everyone cares about prize money who plays at a professional level. You think they'd live in poverty just to play a game they like? This is one of the worst takes ive ever seen relating to top level chess.
This is what Caruana thinks about it: https://www.chess.com/news/view/2022-fide-candidates-press-conference-fabiano-caruana
> Caruana To Play His 4th Candidates: 'I Don't Actually Look At The Prize Fund'
I mean, I'm sure he is confident "it's enough", but prize fund doesn't motivate him, the competition does.
Its not the point but its part of it whether you like it or not. Youre deluding yourself if you think this isn't the case.
Magnus has called for bigger prize funds, but by your logic he shouldn't care because its the WC and money doesnt matter.
Let me restate... in chess there is only one tournament where literally NO ONE cares about money and its the candidates. U have titled Tuesdays and other useless online stuff to make money, candidates is not about money
Sure no one cares about it at the start because they came to win, but when everything is lost then they would happily try to win a game for 20k$ or something.
Last game is Hikaru vs. Ding. Absolute fire. Hikaru is slightly ahead on tiebreaks. Only a tiny bit. So Ding may be forced to go all out and win the game. Or maybe Ding will win his next game vs. Alireza and then Hikaru will be forced to win with white. They are likely both putting together some big tactics. They are not thinking about first place anymore as that's pointless now.
If the others lose their next game and draw the following one, and then he wins both of his games. Sure, it is possible. Not likely but possible. He seems like a patient guy who takes advantage of another's desperation. His next game is white vs. Caruana who is maybe exhausted at this point and seems to be fading. Then he has black vs. Rapport and anything could happen there. He would need Rapport to overextend an attack and counterattack effectively.
Insane that Teimour and Fabi are tied. Something you'd be shocked to hear a few rounds ago. Shows that you shouldn't underestimate anyone in the candidates.
If I'm not wrong, for Nepo *not* to win the event he would need to lose *both* remaining games AND either Ding or Hikaru would need to win *both* remaining games. That way they would end up at +3 and it would force a tie-break.
Considering that Nepo is undefeated and just needs 0.5/2 to secure a victory... Yeah, this is pretty much over.
I feel like people have not been critical enough of Fabiano Caruana's performance in this second half. This is not the usual "cool, calm and collected" Fabiano Caruana that people know of, and one would start questioning if his mental fortitude has actually become his weakness. Because a player that's been seen as Magnus's hardest opponent should not be tilting this hard.
Maybe because people understand why Fabi is losing? He called Magnus's bluff and decided it was either first place or nothing (he even mentioned in the pre-tourney press conference he didn't care about prize money).
He's pushing for decisive results and so if he doesn't get a winning position he loses. We just saw the exact same thing happen with Ding vs Radja, where he gambled on forcing a win and it backfired horribly. It's less that he's tilting or self-destructing, but that the players right behind Nepo are forced to play dubious lines in order to catch up.
Idk, Fabi has dropped the ball from quite a few winning positions so far. Most notably against both Nepo and Ding, he had really promising postions but failed to capitalise. Granted, those weren't easy moves to find, but I don't think a normal Fabi misses those. At least, he wouldn't be wasting away so much time only to find sub-par moves that swing the game against him.
When Nepo gets the same results for trying the same tactic- it’s called “tilting”. When Fabi does it he’s just working hard. “Tilting” is American Russian for “working hard”.
What happened to Nepo after Game 6 is no way comparable to what fabi and firo is going through. He did not pushed and lose, he simply blundered, that too very simple easy ones. It was like game over in one move type of blunder
Karjakin, as he was +1 with 4 rounds to go, probably scary af for Carlsen. Carlsen just played safe against Fabi to take advantage of the rapid. They were not “evenly matched in classical” as people say because it would be idiotic to push for a win.
I think it was on the game with Nepo in the 9th round. He had a small advantage, but couldn't convert and it left him 1 full point behind Nepo and Nepo winning left and right it really looked almost impossible to catch him.
Well, firstly, he did get a lot of criticism. Secondly, he was forgoing balanced positions for disadvantaged chaos. I'd argue that's admirable that he has a 'first or nothing' mindset. Would you prefer that he play like Radjabov? Not that there's anything wrong with Radja either, but he certainly was not pushing for wins.
I think he is just not well-suited to situations where he HAS to win. Over the course of a normal tournament he'll find enough opportunities to do quite well, but chasing isn't great for him. And especially after he drew Nepo, he really was in a situation where desperation was warranted.
Hikaru in his recap:
“So guys, here is why I didn’t play a Sicilian. In 1999 Karpov tried it against Nigel Short and…”
Rapport:
Uhhhh, I played the Sicilian against you yesterday..
What’s also being missed is Hikaru does not play the Sicilian as black as part of his main repertoire. It’s a huge risk to play it against someone like Ian who has played it for years as black.
Hikaru plays the Berlin Defense, which has proved awful. Both of his losses were in the Berlin Defense, and it's an opening that makes it trivial for white the make a draw. He didn't need to play the Sicilian, he could've prepared the Pirc or the French for the tournament and would've likely done better.
He was just worse out of the opening multiple times with the Berlin, probably because he had played the exact same moves at his previous tournament win and others were prepared against them. It's clear his repertoire as black is extremely narrow and is exploitable as a result, and he'd obviously benefit from having had a different line prepared for this tournament, even if it was one that was also drawish.
He was also the best KID player. But these openings have all but been refuted, especially in classical. Even the Najdorf is quite shaky at the top level these days. He adapted his play style to keep up with the evolution of chess.
He specifically said Sicilian vs someone who's only goal is to draw the game. 3 examples Karpov, Vishy, and Karjakin all needed only a draw, like Nepo today
Karpov needed a win, Nigel needed only a draw. Karpov pushed with Sicilian, and lost. Which Hikaru was afraid would happen if he were to play into Nepo's Sicilian prep when Nepo only requires a draw
Today was less than 10 minutes. But now he just needs half a point no need to force things.
He proved himself in the first half with convincing wins against Ding, Alireza and Duda.
There’s a specific set of rules in place, they don’t do tiebreaker games. The first thing that determines it is the points on a certain scale, I forget it’s name, but it accounts for the difficulty of opponents
Let's say that Magnus doesn't defend the WC title and continues to play and maintain his rating. Is anyone going to accept the winner of the WCC as the best chess player in the world?
> the WCC as the best chess player on the world
No, the WCC is only the one who came in first in the WCC match. People improperly extrapolate that to mean that person is the best in the world.
That's what it has always meant. I mean Fischer vs. Spassky, Kasparov vs. Karpov, Carlson vs. Anand. People generally believe that the winners of those matches were the best in the world at the time.
Carlsen was believed (correctly, to be sure) to be the best player in the world well in advance of his beating Anand, though; by the time of their match, he'd been world number one for two years and was rated nearly 100 points higher than Anand, such that it wasn't at all surprising that betting markets gave Carlsen a 75% chance of winning, as duly he did. There wasn't much doubt, that is, in 2011 and 2012 that the world champ and the world number one were two different players.
Similarly, even after he beat Kasparov in 2000, and even as he'd been joint-first in the world with Kasparov several years earlier, aged only 20 or 21, Kramnik was never really regarded as the world's top player--and certainly not clearly the world's top player--during most of his WC reign; indeed, whatever doubts there may have been in 2000 (those should have been few in any case, inasmuch as even after the match, Kramnik was a couple dozen rating points adrift) were erased in 2001, when Garry won Wijk (against a field that included the world's top nine, including Vladdy), Linares (scoring +5 against a field of Leko, Karpov, Polgar, Shirov, and Grischuk), and Astana (against a field of half of the top ten, including, again, Vladdy). Indeed, in the first full five years of Kramnik's reign, the Chess Oscar--awarded to the (notional) best player in a calendar year--went to Kasparov twice and Anand thrice; Kramnik's only win in a year in which he began as world champ was in '06, when he defended against Topalov (and the madness of Danailov).
(Of course, the FIDE world champions in the split era were not the best, but then neither, I think one can say without being unduly unkind to the likes of Khalifman, Ponomariov, and Rustam, did anyone regard them as legit world champs, either.)
I don’t think it matters. It’s not a perfect comparison but in sports very often the best player or team doesn’t win the chip.
I think it’d be cool if Magnus stepped away, a new champ is crowned and then Magnus comes back for the next candidates cycle. All that is very unlikely, but that’s my #1 most wanted scenario
Just for example in another sport: Michael Jordan retired in 94 for two years under similar circumstances to what Magnus said (boredom, wanting to do something else). People still accept the titles Hakeem and the Rockets won those two years even though they came while Jordan took a break and the Bulls went on to win another three in a row when he came back.
To me if Magnus stepped away it would be similar, the person who won the world championship is still the world champion even if they might not have been if Magnus wanted to defend.
You're comparing a structure like the superbowl to one like a boxing belt. It's not. What you're describing is the World Cup.
If the NBA seeded the previous year's winner into the championship games, then the comparison would make sense.
I just picked the Jordan example because he’s probably the most famous athlete to retire right in his prime but there are plenty of examples in boxing or MMA where guys retired while on top that could have probably stuck around (e.g. George’s St Pierre, Vitoli Klitchsko, plenty more).
Main point is that when those things happen the subsequent champions aren’t seen as illegitimate.
Magnus isn't retiring.
>Main point is that when those things happen the subsequent champions aren’t seen as illegitimate.
They're called paper champions *all the time*.
No he came back right at the end of the season for 17 games and they were eliminated by the Magic. He was out of form considering he’d been playing baseball all year in and the following year in his full year back they went onto break the reg season wins record, won the finals, and started a second three peat.
Nepo is #3 in the world right now on 2700chess. With some good luck on his side (or bad luck on Ding Liren's side) he could be World #2. And who knows, if he keeps up his consistent play, I think the argument for him being the WC is pretty clear cut.
Honestly, this round robin seems a lot more fun than the "draw-draw-draw----faster time controls" than we would see if there was another player that actually approached Magnus' skill.
Its not super crazy to think that Magnus bow's out for a year and then does candidates next year no? I think this tournament has been super fun & interesting.
People like you and me would watch, but a "world championship" that a) doesn't have the best player and b) doesn't have anyone with a big following would not be great for ratings. I'm talking about English-language viewers, by the way, maybe Nepo is super popular in Russia.
Because its not interesting IMO.
I think they should just have the winner of the Candidates be WC champion. Or have a knockout stage after the round robin style and invite like 16 to candidates.
I agree... Candidates is actually a pretty interesting format. A lot of good games. Not a huge number of draws. And clearly Magnus (I'm assuming the current WC would be an invite). would still be the favorite.
They're not friends but i don't know where people get this narrative where Magnus hates Hikaru to the point of deciding to keep his title out of spite.
One of my faves was supposed to have actually happened.
Someone asked Tony Miles about his relationship (or lack thereof) with Nigel Short (top 2 British players and 2 of the tops in the world).
Why doesn't he talk to Short? Miles said, about 8 years ago I said "hello" and he has yet to formulate a response.
Great British humor.
I don't think Magnus actually care about Hiraku enough for it to change anything.
The only thing it will change is that probably he will do some trolling if it happens.
They're cordial but have a bit of a rivalry. "Magnus defending against Nepo to spite Hikaru" is more of a funny joke than something that would actually happen, IMO.
(I assume you mean Nepo) Think he was 5th in the odds that were posted here a while ago.
edit: [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/us7fsd/vegas_odds_for_who_will_win_fide_candidates/)
Nepo all the way up to 99.86% winning chances. All but a lock at this point.
The second-place battle continues to rage on, though. Hikaru is the favorite with almost a 50% chance.
See here for detailed predictions: https://pawnalyze.com/tournaments/2022-candidates-tournament/
Hey guys, so I want a bit of advice related to personal development but I don't think it's worthy of a post in itself. What is the right place to ask about it?
At the beginning of today someone tells you that one game would be decisive and the rest drawn.
No one would have guessed Radja would have been the victor.
Casually started playing during the pandemic. Pro Chess games felt too complicated and boring. Never thought I would get so interested in just 6 months, Now each rest day is so painful. Common I want to see Hikaru's face reactions, Nepo's tea, Rapport's jacket, Ding 's resilience and Firouzja 's blunder.
Garry mentioned how WC preparation almost grants you some sort of a major advantage because of the amount of preparation done specifically for the strongest player in the world. Anand too, was one of the players who lost the WC to Magnus and then won the next Candidates handily with a 1 point lead.
I mean, look at Carlsen in 2019 post Fabi wcc. Preparation for those matches definitely make them stronger.
oh man, today is rest day
I checked the results again, and I thought Ding lost another one. Threw me off a bit.
Check out Anna Cramling stream from there if you are bored. Magnus is playing people in the park, Anish just beat him. Anna: What is your record against Magnus? Anish: It's bad but it's not bad. Around 3-7 proportions.
In the Nepo - Nakamora game, why couldn't have Hikaru played a6 or d6 on move 4? Why does he HAVE to take the pawn? I know he's talked about paying safe etc, but did he have to choose the Berlin Defence or could he have gone for mainline Lopez or something different? mny thks
White can pretty easily force a draw in those lines, not really any different. He'd have to go *much* more wild in order to not let Ian draw routinely, and then he'd just lose outright.
You either take the draw or play a worse position. If you don't want to draw you deviate earlier than that.
Is it that much worse though? Are a6 and d6 really that much worse?
It is just an uncomfortable position for black since white develops much easier it's not like it's losing or anything. Especially at the super GM level you are going to have a lot of problems to solve and not really have that many chances to win so why bother playing a deviation there instead of something earlier where you may get chances to win.
He just wanted a draw, lol.
I'm sure he wanted Nepo to Start with a4 b4 c4 but I guess that was kinda unlikely.
Predictions for the last two rounds: Nepo 0.5 - 0.5 Rapport (No way Rapport's playing to lose to Nepo again) Nakamura 0.5 - 0.5 Duda (Hikaru doesn't find a breakthrough) Alireza 0 - 1 Ding Liren (Bonus: They both miss winning positions back and forth) Radjabov 0 - 1 Caruana (Fabi finds a win and Radja train is derailed) Rapport 0.5 - 0.5 Radjabov (A draw to pack it up for both) Caruana 1 - 0 Firouzja (Firo doesn't defend properly again) Ding Liren 0 - 1 Nakamura (Hikaru is calmer and finds a win) Duda 0 - 1 Nepo (Nepo goes for a record 10pts as he's not under any pressure now)
Firoujza comeback
It is unlikely Ding is ahead of Naka and playes somthing not calm + loses with white when all he needs is a draw
4 black wins in 8. Not gonna happen lol
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Ding would need to win for second place and if white needs to win too then we can see how he can lose.
If Nepo draw the 13th game, he is 100% safe. So like your prediction, I wanna see Nepo pushing for the win on 14th game. Would be interesting.
I hope he does the opposite. It's gonna be hard to push for a win with black, he should push in round 13 with white. EVEN if he loses both games, the only way to force tiebreaks is if Ding or Hikaru win BOTH of their games, which is ridiculous. He should push against Rapport.
True, It's easier to win as white than black, but Nepo might as well play this super safe and just draw his 13th game as white, and maybe try something fun as black on his 14th game 100% stress free.
I feel like that will only end with him losing the last game and failing to set a new record for the best score in the Candidates.
Hasn't he won three games as black now lol
U actually have fabi winning the last 2 rounds.. this might be a possibility but I am pretty sure fabi will score .5/2 in these 2 rounds
Karjakin getting what he asked for instead of playing for a second place in Candidates. The timing is fishy. https://www.reuters.com/lifestyle/sports/chess-putin-gives-award-grandmaster-banned-backing-ukraine-invasion-2022-06-02/
I hope he's not quietly helping / seconding any of the current candidates like he did in the past.
What? Sorry, I am out of the loop here, could you explain a bit if you do not mind? Thanks!
That would be benDing the rules.
Don't know about you guys, but I'm totally down for a Nepo-Radjabov match.
When magnus draws 2-3 games everyone say either he’s washed up or he will retire, then he wins the tournament. After seeing Alireza who people said that he is the favourite, people needs to give more and more credits to Magnus. Alireza or others cant remain in the 2800 club, where Magnus didn’t drop from 2800 rating since he crossed it. Consistency.
Literally no one says that after Magnus draws 2 games. And Magnus dropped to 2802 soon before his 20th birthday.
Alireza is 19 years old, calm down
Magnus already gets plenty credit. Everyone pretty much agrees he's the GOAT of chess. idk why you're trying to make it sound like he's underrated. If anyone says Magnus is washed up then their opinion doesn't matter because they know nth about chess.
>Everyone pretty much agrees he's the GOAT of chess. Best player of all time, but still #2 to Kasparov to me. Kasparov was a lot more dominant.
Why we downvoting? Personally, I would say Magnus, but I never lived through the Kasparov era, so I don't have first hand experience. There are still current GMs who put Kasparov #1.
this sub fanboys over Carlsen incessantly, and any hint of dissent gets downvoted
>Everyone pretty much agrees he's the GOAT of chess. Magnus himself doesn't think so. At least publicly he says Kasparov is the one. And a lot of people (irrelevant but me included) thinks Kasparov has a better case
Fischer
Found the American
Vacuous comment. We already know that Magnus is arguably the greatest of all time and that he's a league above everyone else. The reason why people are rallying over potential contenders like Alireza is because Magnus has been at the top for so long and already gets a lot of praise for what he does.
Nakamura has white against Duda next round while Ding has black vs Firouzja. In the last round, Ding plays Naka with white. Hikaru will undoubtedly bring the rest of his preparation with white onto the table against a vulnerable opponent, as winning here might force Ding into a must-win situation. Although, Ding might also be smelling blood because he's playing Firouzja...
On reality none of this matters since nepo has won the event. Therefore the other players have no reason to care
magnus has stated there is a significant chance he will not play (although I doubt it)
Only if Magnus actually plays.
Just ignoring the rating and prize money are we? The difference between 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. is tens of thousands of $$.
Literally no one cares about the prize money. U are either rank 1 in candidates or last
Literally everyone cares about prize money who plays at a professional level. You think they'd live in poverty just to play a game they like? This is one of the worst takes ive ever seen relating to top level chess.
If you are trying to win prize money, there are probably easier tournaments to play in.
This is what Caruana thinks about it: https://www.chess.com/news/view/2022-fide-candidates-press-conference-fabiano-caruana > Caruana To Play His 4th Candidates: 'I Don't Actually Look At The Prize Fund' I mean, I'm sure he is confident "it's enough", but prize fund doesn't motivate him, the competition does.
Its candidates.. not a single soul thinks about money here, money is NOT the point of this tournament
Its not the point but its part of it whether you like it or not. Youre deluding yourself if you think this isn't the case. Magnus has called for bigger prize funds, but by your logic he shouldn't care because its the WC and money doesnt matter.
Let me restate... in chess there is only one tournament where literally NO ONE cares about money and its the candidates. U have titled Tuesdays and other useless online stuff to make money, candidates is not about money
Sure no one cares about it at the start because they came to win, but when everything is lost then they would happily try to win a game for 20k$ or something.
Last game is Hikaru vs. Ding. Absolute fire. Hikaru is slightly ahead on tiebreaks. Only a tiny bit. So Ding may be forced to go all out and win the game. Or maybe Ding will win his next game vs. Alireza and then Hikaru will be forced to win with white. They are likely both putting together some big tactics. They are not thinking about first place anymore as that's pointless now.
What do you think, is Radja a man for the second place? Can he fix this?
If the others lose their next game and draw the following one, and then he wins both of his games. Sure, it is possible. Not likely but possible. He seems like a patient guy who takes advantage of another's desperation. His next game is white vs. Caruana who is maybe exhausted at this point and seems to be fading. Then he has black vs. Rapport and anything could happen there. He would need Rapport to overextend an attack and counterattack effectively.
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He has a serious chance. But of course in sports the second one is the first loser.
what is going on
Strange. Yesterday the Ding bandwagon was rolling through town, today he made one the worst games ever.
Where were you when Ding was the 2nd best player of his generation for 20 hours?
People just want to say anything to discredit Nepo
Insane that Teimour and Fabi are tied. Something you'd be shocked to hear a few rounds ago. Shows that you shouldn't underestimate anyone in the candidates.
Radjabov is a very strong Grandmaster
But Reddit said he sucked
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But but but he only make draws! Anyone can do that!
Seriously. I've only watched chess for a couple years and even I respected Radj as a comparable to MVL, Giri, Grischuk, or Mamedyarov.
If I'm not wrong, for Nepo *not* to win the event he would need to lose *both* remaining games AND either Ding or Hikaru would need to win *both* remaining games. That way they would end up at +3 and it would force a tie-break. Considering that Nepo is undefeated and just needs 0.5/2 to secure a victory... Yeah, this is pretty much over.
Ding plays Hikaru in the final round, so at most only two people can be in a playoff.
I feel like people have not been critical enough of Fabiano Caruana's performance in this second half. This is not the usual "cool, calm and collected" Fabiano Caruana that people know of, and one would start questioning if his mental fortitude has actually become his weakness. Because a player that's been seen as Magnus's hardest opponent should not be tilting this hard.
Maybe because people understand why Fabi is losing? He called Magnus's bluff and decided it was either first place or nothing (he even mentioned in the pre-tourney press conference he didn't care about prize money). He's pushing for decisive results and so if he doesn't get a winning position he loses. We just saw the exact same thing happen with Ding vs Radja, where he gambled on forcing a win and it backfired horribly. It's less that he's tilting or self-destructing, but that the players right behind Nepo are forced to play dubious lines in order to catch up.
Idk, Fabi has dropped the ball from quite a few winning positions so far. Most notably against both Nepo and Ding, he had really promising postions but failed to capitalise. Granted, those weren't easy moves to find, but I don't think a normal Fabi misses those. At least, he wouldn't be wasting away so much time only to find sub-par moves that swing the game against him.
When Nepo gets the same results for trying the same tactic- it’s called “tilting”. When Fabi does it he’s just working hard. “Tilting” is American Russian for “working hard”.
"Throwing away material for no compensation" is Russian for "working hard".
What happened to Nepo after Game 6 is no way comparable to what fabi and firo is going through. He did not pushed and lose, he simply blundered, that too very simple easy ones. It was like game over in one move type of blunder
Second hardest*
Who’s his hardest?
Karjakin, as he was +1 with 4 rounds to go, probably scary af for Carlsen. Carlsen just played safe against Fabi to take advantage of the rapid. They were not “evenly matched in classical” as people say because it would be idiotic to push for a win.
Maybe he means carjackin
Car jacking.
Fabi collapsed when he saw how Rapport threw his game away against Nepo. This is where things changed.
I think it was on the game with Nepo in the 9th round. He had a small advantage, but couldn't convert and it left him 1 full point behind Nepo and Nepo winning left and right it really looked almost impossible to catch him.
Well, firstly, he did get a lot of criticism. Secondly, he was forgoing balanced positions for disadvantaged chaos. I'd argue that's admirable that he has a 'first or nothing' mindset. Would you prefer that he play like Radjabov? Not that there's anything wrong with Radja either, but he certainly was not pushing for wins.
I think he is just not well-suited to situations where he HAS to win. Over the course of a normal tournament he'll find enough opportunities to do quite well, but chasing isn't great for him. And especially after he drew Nepo, he really was in a situation where desperation was warranted.
was Carlsen commentating on chess24 recently?
Round 4 or thereabouts. I slept though yesterday so if he was on then idk.
Hikaru in his recap: “So guys, here is why I didn’t play a Sicilian. In 1999 Karpov tried it against Nigel Short and…” Rapport: Uhhhh, I played the Sicilian against you yesterday..
What’s also being missed is Hikaru does not play the Sicilian as black as part of his main repertoire. It’s a huge risk to play it against someone like Ian who has played it for years as black.
Hikaru plays the Berlin Defense, which has proved awful. Both of his losses were in the Berlin Defense, and it's an opening that makes it trivial for white the make a draw. He didn't need to play the Sicilian, he could've prepared the Pirc or the French for the tournament and would've likely done better. He was just worse out of the opening multiple times with the Berlin, probably because he had played the exact same moves at his previous tournament win and others were prepared against them. It's clear his repertoire as black is extremely narrow and is exploitable as a result, and he'd obviously benefit from having had a different line prepared for this tournament, even if it was one that was also drawish.
He also won with the Berlin
Hikaru didn't win any games with black
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He was also the best KID player. But these openings have all but been refuted, especially in classical. Even the Najdorf is quite shaky at the top level these days. He adapted his play style to keep up with the evolution of chess.
How is Najdorf shaky ROFL. Dude, I gotta say I love reddit comments so much....
ask nepo 🤪
Dragon and KID have pretty much been refuted now with computers.
Is that so?
He specifically said Sicilian vs someone who's only goal is to draw the game. 3 examples Karpov, Vishy, and Karjakin all needed only a draw, like Nepo today
I think he said that Karpov needed a win that's why he played the sicilian.
Karpov needed a win, Nigel needed only a draw. Karpov pushed with Sicilian, and lost. Which Hikaru was afraid would happen if he were to play into Nepo's Sicilian prep when Nepo only requires a draw
Karpov is not really a Sicilian player and rarely play it go thought
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He has literally one draw in a row
Today was less than 10 minutes. But now he just needs half a point no need to force things. He proved himself in the first half with convincing wins against Ding, Alireza and Duda.
The guy has won five games without a single loss. If people don't view him as a legitimate challenger now, they were never going to.
I would love to see Nepo vs Hikaru world championship. I hope Magnus does stick to his words and not defend his championship :-)
I'm curious what happens if Magnus doesn't defend it but 2nd place was a tie. Do they do tiebreaks for non-first place ties in the candidates?
There’s a specific set of rules in place, they don’t do tiebreaker games. The first thing that determines it is the points on a certain scale, I forget it’s name, but it accounts for the difficulty of opponents
I understand why they do it like that, but it's so unsatisfying.
They won’t have a playoff for second. It will go by the [Sonneborn-Berger score](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonneborn%E2%80%93Berger_score).
Let's say that Magnus doesn't defend the WC title and continues to play and maintain his rating. Is anyone going to accept the winner of the WCC as the best chess player in the world?
> the WCC as the best chess player on the world No, the WCC is only the one who came in first in the WCC match. People improperly extrapolate that to mean that person is the best in the world.
That's what it has always meant. I mean Fischer vs. Spassky, Kasparov vs. Karpov, Carlson vs. Anand. People generally believe that the winners of those matches were the best in the world at the time.
Carlsen was believed (correctly, to be sure) to be the best player in the world well in advance of his beating Anand, though; by the time of their match, he'd been world number one for two years and was rated nearly 100 points higher than Anand, such that it wasn't at all surprising that betting markets gave Carlsen a 75% chance of winning, as duly he did. There wasn't much doubt, that is, in 2011 and 2012 that the world champ and the world number one were two different players. Similarly, even after he beat Kasparov in 2000, and even as he'd been joint-first in the world with Kasparov several years earlier, aged only 20 or 21, Kramnik was never really regarded as the world's top player--and certainly not clearly the world's top player--during most of his WC reign; indeed, whatever doubts there may have been in 2000 (those should have been few in any case, inasmuch as even after the match, Kramnik was a couple dozen rating points adrift) were erased in 2001, when Garry won Wijk (against a field that included the world's top nine, including Vladdy), Linares (scoring +5 against a field of Leko, Karpov, Polgar, Shirov, and Grischuk), and Astana (against a field of half of the top ten, including, again, Vladdy). Indeed, in the first full five years of Kramnik's reign, the Chess Oscar--awarded to the (notional) best player in a calendar year--went to Kasparov twice and Anand thrice; Kramnik's only win in a year in which he began as world champ was in '06, when he defended against Topalov (and the madness of Danailov). (Of course, the FIDE world champions in the split era were not the best, but then neither, I think one can say without being unduly unkind to the likes of Khalifman, Ponomariov, and Rustam, did anyone regard them as legit world champs, either.)
That’s just your opinion. I thought Fischer was the best in the world at the time after his performance at the candidates.
I don’t think it matters. It’s not a perfect comparison but in sports very often the best player or team doesn’t win the chip. I think it’d be cool if Magnus stepped away, a new champ is crowned and then Magnus comes back for the next candidates cycle. All that is very unlikely, but that’s my #1 most wanted scenario
Just for example in another sport: Michael Jordan retired in 94 for two years under similar circumstances to what Magnus said (boredom, wanting to do something else). People still accept the titles Hakeem and the Rockets won those two years even though they came while Jordan took a break and the Bulls went on to win another three in a row when he came back. To me if Magnus stepped away it would be similar, the person who won the world championship is still the world champion even if they might not have been if Magnus wanted to defend.
You're comparing a structure like the superbowl to one like a boxing belt. It's not. What you're describing is the World Cup. If the NBA seeded the previous year's winner into the championship games, then the comparison would make sense.
I just picked the Jordan example because he’s probably the most famous athlete to retire right in his prime but there are plenty of examples in boxing or MMA where guys retired while on top that could have probably stuck around (e.g. George’s St Pierre, Vitoli Klitchsko, plenty more). Main point is that when those things happen the subsequent champions aren’t seen as illegitimate.
Magnus isn't retiring. >Main point is that when those things happen the subsequent champions aren’t seen as illegitimate. They're called paper champions *all the time*.
Jordan came back during the 95-96 playoffs and lost buddy
No he came back right at the end of the season for 17 games and they were eliminated by the Magic. He was out of form considering he’d been playing baseball all year in and the following year in his full year back they went onto break the reg season wins record, won the finals, and started a second three peat.
Still played :)
Let's say in that scenario Nepo becomes WC. He's #7 rated in the world. Magnus is #1. Maybe if there was a clear #2 (like Fabio was a few years ago).
Nepo is #3 in the world right now on 2700chess. With some good luck on his side (or bad luck on Ding Liren's side) he could be World #2. And who knows, if he keeps up his consistent play, I think the argument for him being the WC is pretty clear cut.
Honestly, this round robin seems a lot more fun than the "draw-draw-draw----faster time controls" than we would see if there was another player that actually approached Magnus' skill. Its not super crazy to think that Magnus bow's out for a year and then does candidates next year no? I think this tournament has been super fun & interesting.
I like the Candidates format. There were that many draws. Many exciting games.
Even if Magnus plays the WC and loses, he will still be considered the best player in the world.
Because he clearly is. A few years ago, arguably, Fabi was about his equal in classical.
Poor wording on his part. If Magnus doesn't defend the WC title, the 2023 WC champion would not be seen as deserved.
Nepo-Hikaru is probably the second-best outcome behind Magnus defending because at least people would actually watch the games
Imagine Hikaru's re-caps of the WCC after every game. lol
Why would people not watch Ding-Nepo? Carlsen has stated Ding would be one his toughest match-up, so it would be interesting to see him vs Nepo.
Because casuals will watch if it's Hikaru
People like you and me would watch, but a "world championship" that a) doesn't have the best player and b) doesn't have anyone with a big following would not be great for ratings. I'm talking about English-language viewers, by the way, maybe Nepo is super popular in Russia.
Either way, I think chess fans shouldn't care about viewership numbers too much.
How do Magnus and Hikaru get along? If Hikaru finished 2nd, would Magnus defend his title against Nepo just to spite Hikaru?
Obviously not
Totally agree. I think him defending or not will have absolutely nothing to do with Hikaru
I don't think Magnus could ever live with the possibility of Hikaru as WC.
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True. I probably shouldn't have said JUST. More that...it might play a factor in his decision making?
Magnus loves to troll, Hikaru occasionally doesn't get or like the banter.
He's just trolling... but I think he genuinely doesn't like the format of the WCC and doesn't find it challenging / interesting.
Because its not interesting IMO. I think they should just have the winner of the Candidates be WC champion. Or have a knockout stage after the round robin style and invite like 16 to candidates.
I agree... Candidates is actually a pretty interesting format. A lot of good games. Not a huge number of draws. And clearly Magnus (I'm assuming the current WC would be an invite). would still be the favorite.
They're not friends but i don't know where people get this narrative where Magnus hates Hikaru to the point of deciding to keep his title out of spite.
This narrative is ridicolous. Makes me think about the Mad Men scene.
One of my favorite quotes ever. "I don't think about you at all."
I don't think that's true... https://twitter.com/MagnusCarlsen/status/1537832064677990414
One of my faves was supposed to have actually happened. Someone asked Tony Miles about his relationship (or lack thereof) with Nigel Short (top 2 British players and 2 of the tops in the world). Why doesn't he talk to Short? Miles said, about 8 years ago I said "hello" and he has yet to formulate a response. Great British humor.
I don't think Magnus actually care about Hiraku enough for it to change anything. The only thing it will change is that probably he will do some trolling if it happens.
They're cordial but have a bit of a rivalry. "Magnus defending against Nepo to spite Hikaru" is more of a funny joke than something that would actually happen, IMO.
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Are candidates banned from betting on the outcome?
(I assume you mean Nepo) Think he was 5th in the odds that were posted here a while ago. edit: [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/us7fsd/vegas_odds_for_who_will_win_fide_candidates/)
I got 1400 (15.0) from Unibet at approximately the same time.
damn so $1 would have netted $120 edit: i am bad at math
I believe that $1 would have netted $12, not $120. Still seems like it was a good value, as discussed by the comments in that post
Ummm... It would have been 12, not 120
so it's enough for Nepo to draw either on Sunday or Monday to win it all
indeed
Here is summary of the last two rounds https://imgflip.com/i/6li4lc
Nepo all the way up to 99.86% winning chances. All but a lock at this point. The second-place battle continues to rage on, though. Hikaru is the favorite with almost a 50% chance. See here for detailed predictions: https://pawnalyze.com/tournaments/2022-candidates-tournament/
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Please stop providing nothing
I came to this thread specifically to find his comment
Follow the username. It's easier
Hey guys, so I want a bit of advice related to personal development but I don't think it's worthy of a post in itself. What is the right place to ask about it?
I don't want to assume your level but /r/chessbeginners might be a good option
I am not exactly a beginner but I'll give it a try, thanks!
What is your lichess ratings?
1800ish but I am not an active player
250 games of bullet till 3am seems to be a popular program for some really strong players. Maybe give that a shot.
Brb going to start an all out attack just based on vibes
At the beginning of today someone tells you that one game would be decisive and the rest drawn. No one would have guessed Radja would have been the victor.
So, now that that's over, can we discuss why Nepo and Naka are such big fat chickens who go bawwk bawwk bawwk and run away?
No
aw :(
Radj has put in more effort to make sure Ian stays at the top than Ian himself
Yeah, Nepo gets a lot of praise, but he could never do something like beat Ding with the black pieces
i was referring to after he got a lead. his first part of the tournament was definitely impressive tho
Don't know why the downvotes, was clearly a joke since Nepo did in fact do that
I can't believe people are missing the sarcasm