The Week in Chess

The Altibox Norway Chess got under way with two decisive games and an Armageddon tie-break. This and Biel have been the only major elite events played over the board since the halting of the Candidates due to the Coronavirus. I don't have a live feed but will briefly report on the games each day.

Magnus Carlsen managed to hold a comfortable draw against Levon Aronian with black in a Ragozin and they repeated to draw on move 30. In the format of the tournament this meant they played an Armageddon game with the same colours. Aronian got a very large advantage with white on the board and the clock but at one stage became uncertain losing all his time advantage and quickly the advantage on the board, he continued playing too slowly and lost both on the board and on time.

Fabiano Caruana played a striking idea in the Paulsen Sicilian, his 13...Bxe3 has been thought to be an error for years but Rustam Kasimdzhanov came up with a new idea which meant black got a lot of play - his young opponent Arjan Tari had opportunities for equality but after 33.Rd3 his position just got harder and harder and after 36.Be2 he was just lost, resigning on move 55. Caruana said that he was in negotiations over the resumption of the Candidates, he express sympathy with FIDE for the difficult situation and didn't want to talk in detail about it but he said a decision as to whether it will go ahead will have to happen in the next few days.

Jan-Krzysztof Duda grabbed a very hot b7 pawn in a Caro-Kann against Alireza Firouzja, this opened lines against his King in a position where they were already castled on opposite sides. Firouzja thought he had compensation "forever" for the pawn and he had built up a winning position by move 28, it was still complicated and by move 40 the position was very unclear but probably in some way balanced. 44.Nxg3 was certainly possible for white but 46.a5? was the final decisive error when 46.b5 was still a race.

Round 1 Standings: 1 Caruana 3pts 2 Firouzja 3pts 3 Carlsen 1.5pts 4 Aronian 1pts 5 Duda 0pts 6 Tari 0pts

Round 2 4pm BST Tuesday 6th Oct 2020 Carlsen-Firouzja, Caruana-Duda and Aronian-Tari.