Five more draws, would you believe it? No wonder some of the players want to rename the event to an Anish Giri Cup. Anish himself joined in the laughs by refusing to “validate” the tournament. A witty quip, you guys seem to be doing quite OK without me, was his response.
@london_chess We're thinking of renaming it to the Anish Giri Cup
— Fabiano Caruana (@FabianoCaruana) December 4, 2017
Laughs are good, but the facts remain. As much as some commentators may fluff it, there's a sense of doom settling over the future of our beloved game. How do we get across to an average sports fan, when 100% of games are drawn? How far can we go while tinkering with the rules?
A fan doesn't miss a chance to capture footage of her chess heroes | Photo: Lennart Ootes
Stalemate counting as a win would turn upside down the entire endgame theory. By shrinking the margins of error, the reformers may inadvertently cause players to take less risk, not more.
Chess960? Weird configurations of the pieces produce more symmetrical structures (because alternatives are unknown and therefore too risky to try with Black), where the main objective for the participants is to get back to “normal” positions.
Yesterday I threw in an idea of randomizing openings by computer choice. Say, a hundred balls are thrown in the hopper, ten of each for major openings, such as the Ruy Lopez or the Nimzo, with a sprinkling of wild ones, representing the Budapest, the Trompowsky and such. Let the chips fall where they may.
All the same, there were some rather unusual opening choices today, but the results came out the same.
Nepomniachtchi and Caruana look around to see if there is any interesting chess going on in round three | Photo: Lennart Ootes
Nepomniatchi-Caruana was a reversed Pirc, Nakamura-So was a rare English/Sicilian line, and Adams-MVL saw the white rook come out to a3 in the early going. All fizzled out quickly. We won't be deceived by a long game between Michael and Maxime, a 4 vs. 3 rook endgame with the pawns on the same side of the board, since it is as drawish as they come and pretty boring to watch.
The two games I'd like to take a deeper look at had a similar motif of White playing his knight to a3 in the opening.
A school kid is invited to make the opening move on the board with two World Champions | Photo: Lennart Ootes
Carlsen's choice in the Catalan is quite well-known. Anand himself successfully used the same idea in his match with Topalov. White does get some pressure for the sacrificed pawn, but Vishy was prepared to deal with it.
One advantage of being a player no longer in the bloom of youth as Anand is that you have decades of theory and home preparation to fall back upon | Photo: Lennart Ootes
Magnus Carlsen 1/2-1/2 Vishy Anand (Annotated by GM Alex Yermolinsky)
Aronian's Na3 also was not a novelty. I guess the idea was to drag Karjakin kicking and screaming into a Stonewall setup, which Levon succeeded at. I think he realized White had a much worse version of it compared to the regular lines of the Dutch, but it didn't discourage Levon from trying his hardest. First he sacrificed his c4-pawn then offered another. Sergey stayed within the parameters of his solid game plan and despite a shortage of time was in a position to capitalize on Levon's risky play.
Levon Aronian 1/2-1/2 Sergey Karjakin (Annotated by GM Alex Yermolinsky)
Sergey Karjakin learns he was had | Photo: Lennart Ootes
Sergey Karjakin and Levon Aronian explain what happened to Maurice Ashley | Saint Louis Chess Club on YouTube
Both games could have been wins for Black or at least should have gone on for much longer than they did. While I can listen to some explanations for Vishy's and Sergey's decisions, it's their mindset of being satisfied with a draw with Black that's to blame.
The London Classic is an invitational tournament, as all top events are. Invitations are based on ratings. Making draws keeps ratings intact. You draw the conclusions.
Well, we are down to a six-round event now. Time for the players to start winning games, and that's the only thing that would make me shut up with all that gloom and doom talk.
Commentary by GM Yasser Seirawan, WGM Jennifer Shahade and GM Cristian Chirila, with GM Maurice Ashley reporting from London | Source: Saint Louis Chess Club on YouTube
| Rk. | Name | Rtg | Pts. | TB1 | |
| 1 | GM | Carlsen Magnus | 2837 | 1,5 | 0,0 |
| GM | Aronian Levon | 2805 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Caruana Fabiano | 2799 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Vachier-Lagrave Maxime | 2789 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | So Wesley | 2788 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Anand Viswanathan | 2782 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Nakamura Hikaru | 2781 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Karjakin Sergey | 2760 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Nepomniachtchi Ian | 2729 | 1,5 | 0,0 | |
| GM | Adams Michael | 2715 | 1,5 | 0,0 |
