Chessable

85th Tata Steel 2023 (2)

Carlsen joins the leaders after beating Keymer in round 2 of Tata Steel Chess

D Gukesh and Anish Giri at the start of their Round 2 game. Photo ©

D Gukesh and Anish Giri at the start of their Round 2 game. Photo © |

The second round of Wijk aan Zee was another exciting one watched by more than a 1000 spectators on site. Game of the day was played by Anish Giri in defeating D Gukesh with some new ideas in the Ragozin. Magnus Carlsen won after making it slightly difficult for himself, Ding Liren looked like he was headed for 2/2 but failed to convert what seemed to be at one stage a winning position. After two rounds we have four leaders, Carlsen, Giri, Ding and Nodirbek Abdusattorov and one person having a difficult time: Gukesh. Read Michiel Abeln's on the spot report in the main text.

In the Challengers Group Eline Roebers scored a fine win against Erwin L'Ami, Alexander Donchenko defeated Rameshbabu Vaishali and Jergus Pechac suffered his second defeat after losing to M. Amin Tabatabaei, not being rewarded for his boldness in playing the King's Gambit.

Round 2 Standings: 1st-4th Carlsen, Abdusattorov, Ding Liren, Giri 1.5pts 5th-11th Caruana, Aronian, So, Erigaisi, Maghsoodloo, Praggnanandhaa, Van Foreest 1pt 12th-13th Rapport, Keymer 0.5pts 14th Gukesh 0pts.

Round 3 Pairings 1pm GMT Monday 16 January: Rapport-So, Wesley Caruana-Van Foreest, Gukesh-Abdusattorov, Maghsoodloo-Giri, Carlsen-Ding Liren Praggnanandhaa-Keymer, Erigaisi-Aronian.

Michiel Abeln reports from Wijk aan Zee on Round 2 15th Jan

Giri faced the solid Ragozin from Gukesh. They followed one of the main lines until Giri took on d4 with his e-pawn where 13.Qxd4 is the standard move. Still, exd4 has been played before by Mamedyarov, Bu and Korobov and Giri had done some deep preparation. He knew that 16...Bb6 is imprecise and although 17...Kh8 was new for him, it is a bad move and the refutation, 18.Neg5, is a thematic move that Giri had seen in his preparation in similar lines. But converting to a full point should not have been this easy, Gukesh could have defended stronger with 23...Re8 24.h4 Nd7 25.hxg5 Rxe6 26.Qxe6 and White has a clear advantage but not won yet. Gukesh has had an unfortunate start and will be a clear target for the other players.

Levon Aronian against Praggnanandhaa in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln.

Levon Aronian against Praggnanandhaa in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln

Praggnanandhaa decided to follow his countryman Vidit who played the same opening line against Aronian in a blitz game in the Tata tournament in Kolkata in 2019 and then he came with the novelty 14...Be6. Black solved his opening problems and the players quickly reached an equal endgame that ended in a draw.

Wesley So against Arjun Erigaisi in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln.

Wesley So against Arjun Erigaisi in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln

Wesley So obtained a small advantage after a reversed Gruenfeld opening where Erigaisi was less precise with 12...Be6. On move 18 White could have increased his advantage by kicking the rook with a2-a3, a move Erigaisi was afraid of (18.a3 Rc4 19.Qd3). On move 21 So had another improvement with e4 which he missed, but it is not easy to see that sacrificing the exchange after 20...Bg4 brings White a clear advantage. Erigaisi defended correctly and could have made a draw if he had played 26...h4 but after 27.Qb2 he didn’t look at 27...Qxc5 thinking he would lose the rook on h8, but this is actually perpetual check: 28.Qxh8 Qc1+ 29.Kg2 Bd5+ 30.Kh3 Be6+. In the game Black was suffering a bit but still managed to make the draw.

Magnus Carlsen beat Vincent Keymer in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln.

Magnus Carlsen beat Vincent Keymer in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln

Carlsen managed to surprise Keymer by playing 7...c6 in a well-known line of the Grunfeld and Keymer played the somewhat strange looking 12.Bg5. During the game it felt like Keymer was playing against himself, cracking under mental pressure that any game against Carlsen brings. The setup White chose with e4 and d5 gave Black a free game (Carlsen mentioned he thought Black was much further ahead than in a normal Grunfeld) and on move 20 Carlsen had already a clear advantage. White’s knight maneuvers with 23.Nd4 and ending with 27.Nd5 only helped Black. Magnus had a large advantage which he spoiled a bit by trading queens on move 40 (40...Qd4 was stronger). He traded queens because he thought the rook ending was easily winning but once he had reached it, he wasn’t so sure anymore. He said afterwards he calculated precisely and although not sure, he didn’t see a draw for White.

Ding Liren against Parham Maghsoodloo in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln.

Ding Liren against Parham Maghsoodloo in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln

Ding Liren and Maghsoodloo played a main line Spanish that was, among others, played by Anand in 2010 against Shirov here in Wijk aan Zee. The big question was whether Black should play 15..,Re7 or 15...Rf8, the engine approves Parham’s choice in the game and he confirmed afterwards he was still in his preparation. In the press room Anand, Piket and Aronian discussed for White the option 20.Bxf7+ Kxf7 21.Qd5+ Kf8 22.fxg7+ Kxg7 23.e5 dxe5 24.Qe4 and they thought they remembered from some old preparation that this is clearly better for White, but the engine says 0.000. The game continued with 21...Kxg7 where Parham afterwards said that 21...Re8 was stronger because than White doesn’t get the chance to play e4-e5. Perhaps Black should have kept things closed with 24...d5, Parham said he missed that White could go 27.g4. Ding got some initiative and went for it by sacrificing material with 35.Kh5 followed by giving up his rook. His three pawns looked very dangerous and maybe he missed a win somewhere [Svidler in commentary predicted the sacrifice and was surprised 37.Ra7 wasn't played pinning the bishop and hoping to exchange rooks too, this he thought was winning - perhaps also finding a way to play cxb4 too MC] but the players couldn’t find it afterwards and the engine is also not clear.

Fabiano Caruana in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln.

Fabiano Caruana in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln

Another Ragozin was played in the game between Abdusattorov and Caruana where White played the rare move 9.Ne5 and even more rare 10.Be2. Caruana played the imprecise 10...cxd4 followed by Qb6 when White started the endgame with a small plus. His best chance was on move 22 when he should have played 22.Bf5 Ra1+ 23.Rb1 Ra7 and White can continue to press. In the game Caruana managed to trade off to a rook endgame that is well-known to be a draw, in fact an easier draw with the double-pawns than if Black’s structure would still have been normal.

Jorden van Foreest against Richard Rapport in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln.

Jorden van Foreest against Richard Rapport in Wijk aan Zee Round 2 Photo © Michiel Abeln

Van Foreest played against Rapport a move that has only been seen once before at top level: Caruana played 12.Qh3 against Gelfand in Biel 2009. A move that Rapport may not be familiar with, but then they deviated on move 15 when White exchanged queens on c8. Van Foreest admitted afterwards he was mixing up different lines from his preparation. Subsequently White was under some pressure but White defended well and the game ended in a draw.

85th Tata Steel Masters Wijk aan Zee (NED), 13-29 i 2023 cat. XX (2741)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4
1. Carlsen, Magnus g NOR 2859 * . . . . ½ . . . . . . 1 . 2908
2. Abdusattorov, Nodirbek g UZB 2713 . * . . ½ . . . . . . 1 . . 2946
3. Ding, Liren g CHN 2811 . . * . . . . . ½ . . . . 1 2915
4. Giri, Anish g NED 2764 . . . * ½ . . . . . . . . 1 2938
5. Caruana, Fabiano g USA 2766 . ½ . ½ * . . . . . . . . . 1 2738
6. Aronian, Levon g USA 2735 ½ . . . . * . . . ½ . . . . 1 2771
7. So, Wesley g USA 2760 . . . . . . * ½ . . ½ . . . 1 2701
8. Erigaisi, Arjun g IND 2722 . . . . . . ½ * . ½ . . . . 1 2722
9. Maghsoodloo, Parham g IRI 2719 . . ½ . . . . . * . . . ½ . 1 2753
10. Praggnanandhaa, R g IND 2684 . . . . . ½ . ½ . * . . . . 1 2728
11. Van Foreest, Jorden g NED 2681 . . . . . . ½ . . . * ½ . . 1 2750
12. Rapport, Richard g ROU 2740 . 0 . . . . . . . . ½ * . . ½ 2504
13. Keymer, Vincent g GER 2696 0 . . . . . . . ½ . . . * . ½ 2596
14. Gukesh, D g IND 2725 . . 0 0 . . . . . . . . . * 0
Round 2 (January 15, 2023)
Abdusattorov, Nodirbek - Caruana, Fabiano ½-½ 54 D38 QGD Ragozin
Ding, Liren - Maghsoodloo, Parham ½-½ 79 C78 Ruy Lopez Moeller Defence
Giri, Anish - Gukesh, D 1-0 27 D38 QGD Ragozin
Aronian, Levon - Praggnanandhaa, R ½-½ 32 C80 Ruy Lopez Open
So, Wesley - Erigaisi, Arjun ½-½ 48 A35 English Symmetrical
Van Foreest, Jorden - Rapport, Richard ½-½ 55 C42 Petroff's Defence
Keymer, Vincent - Carlsen, Magnus 0-1 65 D91 Gruenfeld 5.Bg5
Tata Steel Challengers Wijk aan Zee (NED), 13-29 i 2023 cat. XIV (2580)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4
1. Mishra, Abhimanyu g USA 2559 * . . . . . ½ . . . 1 . . . 2678
2. Donchenko, Alexander g GER 2627 . * . . ½ . . . . . . . 1 . 2732
3. Tabatabaei, M. Amin g IRI 2686 . . * . . ½ . . . . . . . 1 2816
4. Warmerdam, Max g NED 2616 . . . * . . . ½ . . . . . 1 2815
5. Sindarov, Javokhir g UZB 2654 . ½ . . * . . . ½ . . . . . 1 2606
6. Adhiban, Baskaran g IND 2610 . . ½ . . * . . . ½ . . . . 1 2600
7. Yilmaz, Mustafa g TUR 2609 ½ . . . . . * . ½ . . . . . 1 2572
8. Supi, Luis Paulo g BRA 2608 . . . ½ . . . * . . . ½ . . 1 2621
9. Ivic, Velimir g SRB 2585 . . . . ½ . ½ . * . . . . . 1 2631
10. Beerdsen, Thomas m NED 2515 . . . . . ½ . . . * . . ½ . 1 2517
11. Roebers, Eline m NED 2361 0 . . . . . . . . . * 1 . . 1 2593
12. L'Ami, Erwin g NED 2627 . . . . . . . ½ . . 0 * . . ½ 2291
13. Vaishali, Rameshbabu m IND 2425 . 0 . . . . . . . ½ . . * . ½ 2378
14. Pechac, Jergus g SVK 2637 . . 0 0 . . . . . . . . . * 0
Round 2 (January 15, 2023)
Adhiban, Baskaran - Beerdsen, Thomas ½-½ 59 D43 Anti-Meran Gambit
Yilmaz, Mustafa - Mishra, Abhimanyu ½-½ 30 D44 Anti-Meran Gambit
Supi, Luis Paulo - Warmerdam, Max ½-½ 25 C50 Giuoco Piano
Ivic, Velimir - Sindarov, Javokhir ½-½ 58 D86 Gruenfeld Simagin
Roebers, Eline - L'Ami, Erwin 1-0 46 C95 Ruy Lopez Breyer
Vaishali, Rameshbabu - Donchenko, Alexander 0-1 31 B84 Sicilian Scheveningen
Pechac, Jergus - Tabatabaei, M. Amin 0-1 45 C34 Kings Knight Gambit

Tata Steel Chess Round 2 Commentary

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