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Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi secured their spots in the final match of the Champions Chess Tour Finals with surprisingly swift semifinal victories. Carlsen defeated Maxime Vachier-Lagrave 3½-1½, while Nepomniachtchi scored an even more dominant win over Alireza Firouzja. The two contenders from the 2021 World Chess Championship are now set to renew their rivalry in what promises to be an intense battle for the title on Saturday.
The semifinals, following the round-robin and survival stages, featured 6-game matches played under the same fast-paced time control of 10 minutes plus 2-second increments. As the winner of the round-robin, Carlsen chose to face Vachier-Lagrave, though the Norwegian admitted the decision required little thought given the strength of both potential opponents. The choice paid off, as Carlsen's consistent form saw him through to another final.
Carlsen and Vachier-Lagrave began their match with a pair of decisive games, both players winning with the white pieces. However, Carlsen took control in the second half, winning games 3 and 5 while MVL managed only a draw in game 4. Reflecting on his performance, MVL acknowledged the difficulty of defeating Carlsen when "he's close to his best," while Carlsen, ever the perfectionist, expressed dissatisfaction with certain aspects of his play despite the convincing win.
In the other semifinal, Nepomniachtchi's dominant performance against Firouzja was unexpected, given Firouzja's impressive tour results this year, including three final appearances and a win over Carlsen at the Chess.com Classic. However, Firouzja's loss in game 1 with the white pieces appeared to unsettle him, leading to a cascade of errors. Nepomniachtchi capitalised, winning games 1, 2 and 4, sealing the match victory with two games to spare. As Carlsen noted, Firouzja struggled to strike the right balance between aggression and accuracy after his initial setback.
The first game of the match saw Carlsen finding a remarkable tactical shot in 30.Rd5. Of course, the direct 30...exd5 fails to 31.Nxd5, with a royal fork, but the line that Carlsen foresaw (which appeared on the board) is surely admirable.
Engines give Black a slight edge, based on positional ideas. However, MVL needs to be extremely careful to prevent his opponent from making the most of his initiative.
There followed 30...Rd7 31.Qe4 Ne5, and here Carlsen showed his idea by playing 32.Rxc5
After 32...dxc5 (better is 32...Qf5 or 32...Ra2) White simplifies into a pawn-up endgame via 33.Rxd7+ Kxd7 34.Qb7+
Carlsen had little trouble converting his advantage into a 49-move win.
Nepo's victory had a lot to do with endgame skill and time management. In game 3, for example, Firouzja failed to convert the following position - with an extra minor piece - into a victory (which would have tied the score).
Of course, the youngster would manage to convert this into a win in a classical game, but at this point he had less than one minute on the clock, while Nepo had more than two minutes still. A combination of time trouble and resourceful defence by Black led to a draw which most likely had a psychological impact on Firouzja.
