Anyone want to play a game of chess?

Great to hear. Looks like Magnus threw for content, well played.

I honestly wonder if the decisive games are due to the recent advances in computer play. Carlsen-Caruana was a long time ago, and it seems to me like top level chess has a lot fewer draws these days.

I think it helps that there’s no defending champion this time. Carlsen has talked about how he became more focused on not losing as a defending champion. One of the reasons he didn’t want to continue doing it.

Personally I think defending champion rules should just go away in general.

Carlsen agrees with this. I’m not sure if the format he prefers is ideal (he has previously proposed a knock-out style tournament where the champion would get no special advantages), but I definitelty think a more open tournament format with multiple contenders would be ideal for generating more interest around these matches.

Case in point: the past 5 world championship matches have generated hours of live television coverage here in Norway, in addition to studio TV, etc. This year? Nothing. Even the news coverage has been anemic. More competitors would allow for a lot broader coverage and generate a lot more general public interest.

What a match! I’m glued to watching every game.

Hikaru Nakamura from his latest video: “It’s a complete toss-up. I don’t know what I’m talking about.”

Ding just played his best game of the championship. The final position looks more like a find the checkmate problem than the ending of an actual contest.

Will it generate much coverage if Carlsen isn’t taking part?

Has anything been said about the teams they have supporting them? Usually we don’t hear much about seconds until after. I know Putin was making noise about it being a national priority at one point (Karjakin, or last Nepo match), but this is probably their best shot at grabbing it again so wondering if they are putting resources into supporting Nepo. China has never pursued it like that, but they could put a lot into it as well with Liren being in the match if they wanted. It isn’t like they to rely on the generosity of Rex like someone from the US would to field any team of seconds.

I know that Richard Rapport is on Ding’s team; he’s been pretty visible at the match.

wow, Ding just outplayed Nepo. Hard to see where Nepo did go wrong. When the game was still going Ding had a small edge, I did not think he would convert. When I came back later, he won and played a brilliant game.

Will Nepo be able to get another win? Amazing match, 4 decissive games already… This match will go down in history if they continue like this.

Doubt it - but that’s my point: more contestants would mean that more countries would have a stake in the competition. You’d have Norway, Russia, China, France, USA, Holland, maybe India all invested in the outcome, rather than right now only Russia and China (outside of those with a particular interest in Chess).

Nepo has made official statements against the war in Ukraine, including condemning it on the day the war broke out (pretty ballsy move, since he’s still living in Russia), so I’m pretty sure he’s not on any Christmas card list of Putin. I doubt there is much support to be had there, but no doubt they’ll use an eventual victory for propaganda purposes, whether Nepo likes it or not.

Yeah, I think they should just tack on extra classical games if needed to make sure there’s a clear winner in classical.

Jesus Ding, I was yelling at my monitor. Never seen something like that.

Game 8: Jesus Ding, I was yelling at my monitor. Never seen something like that.

wtf, he had enough time to calculate. This is a strange tournament, are they playing sloppy? The nerves? What’s going on?

Chess is hard. It’s a lot easier to analyze with the computer bar telling you if you’re right or wrong or even just how good/bad the current position is for you.

Someone made the point to me that Magnus was such a genius at endgame play that he often created boring middlegames looking to angle into a winnable (for him) endgame. Whereas other players prefer a tactical melee.

I also just think that post-Alpha Zero computer analysis has given them confidence that small edges are worth attacking and temporary imbalances can be major advantages. The Candidates had a lot of decisive games too.

So far this is one of the most entertaining world championship matches ever - and probably the most interesting one without personal conflicts between the players. Both Ding and Nepo behave in a civilized way.

It seems Ding isn’t in his best sporting form. Another problem is his lack of experience in long matches. Nepo’s match against Carlsen gives him a considerable advantage.

Ding feels the never ending permanent pressure put on the players during the match, especially the trailing player. Both playes make more mistakes than usual.

Some news not posted in this thread yet: Parts of Ding’s preparation have been leaked. People on the internet have found accounts with games played between two newbie players. The games repeated both the h3 novelty by Ding and yesterday’s Ra2 plus the piece sac.
Opinions on how bad that is are split. Some GM I don’t know says, it’s very bad, while former challenger Caruana says, it’s no big deal because the games only include minor stuff.

Hikaru Nakamura takes a look at some of the leaked games on his channel and talks about both the likelihood that they’re legit (spoiler: almost certainly) and the potential impact.

I have seen things like that and I have experienced it, of course in way more unimportant games. It’s terrible. Your brain stops functioning, there’s some kind of blockade.
Giri called it on the Chess.com / Chess24 livestream, and he described it very well.

I don’t think Ding had a way out of it when the situation became clear after a few minutes.
Kasparov’s and Kramnik’s mentor, early coach and former world champion Botvinnik wrote a long time ago, something like: If a professional player finds out, during a game against a colleague, that he can no longer calculate correctly and he starts blundering pieces during calculation, the correct reaction is to minimize the damage by immediately offering a draw.
A match is one on one though. I bet Nepo would have sensed something is wrong. Of course in hindsight Ding should have offered a draw. Maybe the few minutes Nepo would have taken to refuse it would have helped Ding get his brain online again.

Thanks!

image

Umm, Ding already did?

Headline writers strike again!

they are still playing? Looked like a draw ages ago…