The Week in Chess

Ian Nepomniachtchi leads the FIDE Candidates with 4.5/7 at the half way stage. Nepomniachtchi hasn't looked that steady in the last three rounds and in Round 7 he and Hikaru Nakamura engaged in a memory competition for a mind bending computer line in the Petroff. It seems that Nepomniachtchi was the first to forget something important as 21...Bf5? was significantly worse than 21...Kg8. Nakamura thought for a long time over his 25.Qe2?! which turned out to be distinctly second best to 24.Ndf3 (eval over +1) Nepomniachtchi obviously realised the problem and after Qe2 bashed out 25...Ne4! immediately with obvious relief, the game was level and Nepomniachtchi had no problem proving it.

Alireza Firouzja is going to be a dangerous wildcard as he's pretty obviously out of contention to win the thing, not least because he's obviously not playing well, but today he beat joint leader Gukesh. Firouzja played the London and Gukesh was level at move 20 and better after 21.Ra1?! gradually the game equalised and Queen's came off. But on the run up to first time control Gukesh bet that his passed a-pawn was more important than Firouzja's kingside threats, the evaluation remained level until 36...Kh7? (36...b5) 37.Rf3 a3? (37...Kg8 was better but still losing) and Firouzja had forced mate after 39.Nf8!

Fabiano Caruana played the Advanced French against Praggnanandhaa. The Indian has been switching his openings virtually every round and has been very unpredictable. Caruana was better out of the opening but by move 17 it was black for choice, trades steadily happened and a draw was agreed on move 41.

Santosh Vidit got serious winning chances on the black side of a Ruy Lopez against Nijat Abasov. At first white was better but 31.Ne2? was a mistake after which black took over for a bit but on the runup to first time control neither side played the best 37...Rd6? (37.Qd6!) 39.Nb1? (39.Nc3=) and 41.g4?= (41.Rh7!) After this equality remained and the game was drawn in 52 moves.

Round 7 Standings: 1st Nepomniachtchi 4.5pts 2nd= Gukesh, Caruana, Praggnanandhaa 4.0pts 5th= Nakamura, Vidit 3.5pts 7th Firouzja 2.5pts 8th Abasov 2.0pts

Rest Day 12th April

Round 8 13th April at 19:30BST: Nakamura-Caruana, Nepomniachtchi-Abasov, Praggnanandhaa-Firouzja, Vidit-Gukesh.