Magnus Carlsen wins Isle of Man Open

'Bored' one

The top game, Carlsen-Nakamura, as many had suspected, was anticlimactic. Magnus only needed a draw to seal the tournament, and one shouldn't expect Hikaru to go hog-wild with the black pieces. In the past two years of their personal encounters Nakamura has done more than a decent job righting his ship, and this was not the time to risk a setback.

The final game on board one between Hikaru Nakamura and Magnus Carlsen might seem disappointing, but it was a predictable and logical result | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Three boards were filled with players hoping to catch Hikaru for a share of second place, but only one managed to ascend. The great Vishy Anand put up a clinic on how to handle a last round money game. First, a quiet opening, then a slow build-up culminating in a sudden tactical shot. It is hard to blame Hou Yifan for succumbing, as Vishy's play was absolutely perfect. See for yourself.

Hou Yifan succumbed to Vishy Anand in the final round, but cannot blame herself: not only did she have a great tournament overall, but her opponent produced a masterpiece, which is what it took to beat her | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Viswanathan Anand vs Hou Yifan (annotated by Alex Yermolinsky)

A World champion's guide to the Petroff

The great popularity of the Petroff Defence at the highest level has attracted general attention as strong players employ this opening with great success and with both colours. Unfortunately, the opinion of the Petroff as a sterile drawish opening seems to be firmly implanted in many minds. The author tries to dispel these myths and examines the most popular lines and provides a large number of ideas that will enable you to play Petroff successfully, with either colour.

Former rivals Vishy Anand and Boris Gelfand who played for the world title in 2012 have friendly chat. Anand's last win brought him a share of second-third with Nakamura. | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Not to be outdone was another former Champ and Anand's long-time adversary, Vladimir Kramnik. He had Black against a dangerous opponent, Gawain Jones. Once again, we witness a calm professional approach to such situations. Kramnik simply played his kind of game, and once an opportunity presented itself he was there to capitalize.

In spite of a catastrophic first half of a tournament, Vladimir Kramnik dug 'oh so deep' and put himself together to finish on 6½/9 | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Gawain Jones vs Vladimir Kramnik (annotated by Alex Yermolinsky)

Among the unexpected results was that of 27-year-old GM Swapnil Dhopade who had the tournament of his life with a 2768 performance against elite players and finished with 6.0/9, tied for 4th-12th

GM Swapnil Dhopade had the tournament of his life | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Looking at the final standings we can see a total reversal of the World Cup turmoil. The higher-rated players ended up occupying all the top spots. I guess, ratings do mean something.

A good example of “muscling” the otherwise even game to his favor was given by Fabiano Caruana in the battle against his compatriot, Varuzhan Akobian.

Fabiano Caruana bounced back from his disappointing loss to Carlsen in round eight, and outplayed his compatiot Varuzhan Akobian in the last round | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Varuazhan Akobian vs Fabiano Caruana (annotated by Alex Yermolinsky)

There were a lot of wins for the experienced players today. Michael Adams, Alexei Shirov, Emil Sutovsky and James Tarjan were able to overcome their much younger opposition. In Tarjan's case we have one of the best performances of the 21st Century by a player in his 60's. Congrats!

James Tarjan, 65 years old, finished in beauty by beating Alexandra Kosteniuk in the last round. Just out of retirement (in chess) with a modest 2412 rating, his final performance was an impressive 2671 | Photo: John Saunders

American IM Michael Brown was also rewarded for his play with a grandmaster norm | Photo: John Saunders

In conclusion, I'd like to thank all the participants of the Isle of man event for giving us great games.

At the table with his trophies, Magnus Carlsen enjoys some relaxation with his girlfriend Synne Christin Larsen | Photo: Chess.com / Maria Emelianova

Results for round nine (top 20)

Final standings (top 25)

Links

• Official tournament site
• ChessBase Live Broadcast (with many games analyzed)
• Complete standings (Chess-Results)

You can use ChessBase 14 or any of our Fritz compatible chess programs to replay the games in PGN. You can also download our free Playchess client, which will in addition give you immediate access to the chess server Playchess.com.