The Week in Chess

The first day of the FIDE Online Nations Cup already provided some pointers as to the eventual winners of the competition with China having a perfect two wins out of the two matches played and the USA having a win and a draw.

China won both their matches beating the Rest of the World Team 3-1 thanks to wins from Yu Yangyi and Women's number one Hou Yifan. They then beat the Europe side 3-1 too with a second win for Yu Yangyi and a win for Women's World Champion Ju Wenjun.

The United States have a powerful squad too and seem to have also come with a plan. Hikaru Nakamura plays top board and his job seems to be solid, on board two is Fabiano Caruana and he has 2 wins after beating Vidit and Artemiev in endgames. The USA drew 2-2 with India with Humpy Koneru's win against Anna Zatonskih levelling up Caruana's effort, they then beat Russia 3-1 with two draws from So and Krush and Nakamura beating Nepomniachtchi in the final game to finish where the Russian tried to create something out of nothing to try and level the match but only succeeded in losing.

Round 1 results: Europe 2-2 Russia, China 3-1 RoW, India 2-2 USA.

Round 2 results: Russia 1-3 USA, RoW 2.5-1.5 India, Europe 1-3 China.

Round 2 Standings: China 4pts, USA 3pts, Row 2pts, India, Russia, Europe 1pts.

The 6 teams meet twice over 10 rounds and the top two teams qualify for the super final on Sunday.

Day 2

Round 3 pairings 2pm BST 6th May: China-Russia, India-Europe, USA-Row

Round 4 pairings 3:45pm BST 6th May: Russia-RoW, Europe-USA nad China-India