Airthings Masters, Day 2: Six leaders, lots of draws

Airthings Masters, Day 2

Round 5

In round 5 Dubov played with Black against Magnus Carlsen who was eager to win a game after starting day 1 with four draws. After an interesting opening and a lively middlegame Carlsen managed to reach an endgame with a pawn up, which, however, was hard to win. But with his fine technique Carlsen managed to pose Dubov problem after problem and in the end Dubov cracked and lost.

With 1.0/4 Anish Giri had a disastrous day 1 and on day 2 he was determined to do better - which he showed in his energetic and fine win against Pentala Harikrishna.

The other four games of the round were all drawn, after more or less fighting. Hikaru Nakamura and Wesley So played the shortest and quickest game of the round by following a well-known line of the Berlin that leads to a repetition.

Round 6

But in round 6 Giri suffered another setback by losing directly out of the opening against Dubov.

The other games of the round all ended in a draw. In fact, this was the last win of day 2 - the remaining twelve games in round 7 and 8 all ended peacefully.

Round 7

Round 8

But despite the high number of draws, some of the games were still interesting, e.g. the theoretical duel between David Anton and Alexander Grischuk.

The game between Carlsen and Giri was also interesting. After all, these two enjoy a long-standing rivalry that both like to keep alive on Twitter. In this game Giri had no problems with Black but missed a chance to put Carlsen under more pressure.

After eight of eleven rounds six players share the lead with 4½/8 each but all twelve players can still hope to qualify for the knock-out stage. This might lead to an exciting day three, and though only 18 games will be played, the number of wins will be probably higher than on day 2.

Standings after round 8

Rk.		Name	Rtg.	Nt.	Pts.	n	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	TB	Perf.
1		Nakamura,H	2736		4.5	8		½	½	½		½	1	½	½	½			3.50	2805
2		Aronian,L	2781		4.5	8	½		½	½	½		½	½	½		1		3.00	2823
3		Radjabov,T	2765		4.5	8	½	½			½	½	½	½			½	1	3.00	2803
4		So,W	2770		4.5	8	½	½			½		½	½	½		1	½	2.50	2813
5		Carlsen,M	2862		4.5	8		½	½	½		1			½	½	½	½	2.50	2789
6		Dubov,D	2699		4.5	8	½		½		0		½		½	½	1	1	1.50	2805
7		Grischuk,A	2777		4.0	8	0	½	½	½		½		1		½		½	3.00	2743
8		Nepomniachtchi,I	2784		4.0	8	½	½	½	½			0		1	½	½		2.00	2764
9		Vachier-Lagrave,M	2784		3.5	8	½	½		½	½	½		0		½		½	2.50	2712
10		Harikrishna,P	2732		3.5	8	½				½	½	½	½	½		0	½	2.50	2717
11		Giri,A	2764		3.0	8		0	½	0	½	0		½		1		½	1.50	2672
12		Anton Guijarro,D	2675		3.0	8			0	½	½	0	½		½	½	½		1.50	2682
TBs: Koya, Wins with black, Wins

Games

Links

• Official website
• Airthings Masters, Day 1: Five players share the lead
• All reports on the Skilling Open