Game of the Week #600
The World Rapid Championship in Samarkand saw Magnus Carlsen grabbing his fifth tite in this category!
The amount of surprising results between established elite players and relatively unknown players was remarkable, however. The game Carlsen won in the fifth round against blindfold simultaneous expert Timur Gareyev was interesting for a few reasons: it was a model game in trademark Carlsen style, despite not refuting Black’s topical and ambitious opening play.
Warm-up question: What would you play here with White?
M. Carlsen - T Gareyev, Samarkand 2023
This week’s show
In this opening Black opts for active piece play and is not afraid to fight for the initiative from an early stage. One of the many good features of this opening is that Black is often the side which controls the pace of the game.
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