World Championship Game 10: Safety first

by Carlos Alberto Colodro
12/8/2021 – An uneventful draw in game 10 of the World Championship match kept Magnus Carlsen’s 3-point lead going into the fourth rest day of the contest. The defending champion only needs to score 1 point in the remaining 4 encounters to keep his crown. | Photo: Niki Riga

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Damage limitation


Full expert analysis of the game will be published shortly on our news site. Game 9 will be annotated by Filipino-born American grandmaster Wesley So!


A 41-move draw with little to no excitement was the result of game 10 at the World Championship match in Dubai. Ian Nepomniachtchi, down 3 points on the scoreboard, shied away from going all-in with the black pieces after painful blunders in back-to-back games. He now needs to score 3½ points in the remaining 4 games to take the match to rapid and blitz playoffs.

After the short day at the office, Magnus Carlsen described his rival’s approach as one focused on “damage limitation”. Instead of playing the Sicilian or an aggressive setup in the Caro-Kann, Nepo once again chose the Petroff Defence. The Russian, who was clearly ‘tilted’ in the previous two encounters, decided either to eliminate any ambitions he had in the match or prepare something special for the games following Thursday’s rest day.

The contenders went through the motions until move 41, as they could not agree to a draw before the first time control. A completely symmetrical pawn structure was left on the board, with a king and a knight per side fully unable to create any problems for the opponent.

 
Carlsen vs. Nepomniachtchi

Draw.

Magnus Carlsen

World champion Magnus Carlsen | Photo: Niki Riga

The match is practically over, and apparently we already saw the most exciting part of the much-anticipated confrontation up until game 9. It is time to assess what went on in Dubai, and we will surely see a number of interviews and analyses by world-class players and commentators once the match is over.

For now, we have an excellent clip produced by ChessBase India’s Sagar Shah, who interviewed multiple world champion Vishy Anand. The ‘Tiger from Madras’ has all the experience in the world about this subject, and referred to Nepo’s collapse using examples from his own World Championship matches:

Basically, it was a complete loss of control. When you have a disastrous game, logically, you will say ‘losing two games is not gonna make me feel better, what has happened has happened, let us move on’. That’s what you’re supposed to do, that’s what most people think will happen. But under the strain and pressure, what very often unfortunately happens is that you make the problem even worse for yourself — you lose one more, in this case it was two more.

And somehow you can’t stop because then you go back home and you know you should be trying to find some hope, but you don’t believe in it, so then you get angry.

I felt something similar in Chennai. I lost games 5 and 6, and luckily I made two draws. You know, what to do? Not rushing anything. But then I managed to prepare something nice, I got an advantage in game 9, and unfortunately I lost it. [...] At least, games 9 and 10 I played at some level. The problem is when you make a move like [Nepo’s] 27...c5, you don’t even know what to tell yourself any more.



The champion and the challenger will get a rest day on Thursday. The whole match could come to an end on Friday, as a win for Carlsen would secure him overall victory with a score of 7½ points.

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1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 0-0 8.h3 Na5 9.Nxe5 Nxb3 10.axb3 Bb7 11.d3 d5 C88: Closed Ruy Lopez: Anti-Marshall Systems. 12.exd5 Qxd5 13.Qf3 Bd6
White must now prevent ...Qxe5.White is slightly better. 14.Kf1! Rfb8 Threatens to win with ...Qxe5. 15.Qxd5 Nxd5 16.Bd2 c5
17.Nf3N Predecessor: 17.Nc3 Nb4 18.Rac1 Rd8 19.Ng4 f5 20.Ne5 Rac8 21.Re2 Re8 22.Nf3 Rf8 23.Re6 1-0 (61) Bellegotti,G (2415)-Sychov,A (2196) ICCF email 2016 17...Rd8 18.Nc3 Nb4 19.Rec1 Rac8 20.Ne2 Nc6 21.Be3 Ne7 22.Bf4 22.Nc3 is more complex. Nf5 23.Ne4 Bf8 24.g4 Nxe3+ 25.fxe3 g6 26.Ke2 22...Bxf3 23.gxf3 Bxf4 24.Nxf4 Rc6 25.Re1 Nf5 26.c3 Nh4 27.Re3 Kf8 28.Ng2 Nf5 29.Re5 g6 30.Ne1 30.Ke2 is interesting. Ng7 31.Nf4 Rf6 32.Re4 b4 33.Ra5 30...Ng7 31.Re4 f5 32.Re3 Ne6 33.Ng2 b4 34.Ke2 Rb8 35.Kd2 bxc3+ 36.bxc3 Rxb3 37.Kc2 Rb7 38.h4 Kf7 39.Ree1 The position is equal. Kf6 40.Ne3 Rd7 41.Nc4
Ne5 is the strong threat. 41...Re7 42.Ne5 Rd6 43.Nc4 Rc6 44.Ne5 Rd6 45.Nc4 Weighted Error Value: White=0.04/Black=0.03
½–½
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WhiteEloWBlackEloBResYearECOEventRnd
Nepomniachtchi,I2782Carlsen,M2855½–½2021C88FIDE World Championship 20211.1
Carlsen,M2855Nepomniachtchi,I2782½–½2021E05FIDE World Championship 20212.1
Nepomniachtchi,I2782Carlsen,M2855½–½2021C88FIDE World Championship 20213.1
Carlsen,M2855Nepomniachtchi,I2782½–½2021C42FIDE World Championship 20214.1
Nepomniachtchi,I2782Carlsen,M2855½–½2021C88FIDE World Championship 20215.1
Carlsen,M2855Nepomniachtchi,I27821–02021D02FIDE World Championship 20216.1
Nepomniachtchi,I2782Carlsen,M2855½–½2021C88FIDE World Championship 20217.1
Carlsen,M2855Nepomniachtchi,I27821–02021C43FIDE World Championship 20218.1
Nepomniachtchi,I2782Carlsen,M28550–12021A13FIDE World Championship 20219.1
Carlsen,M2855Nepomniachtchi,I2782½–½2021C42FIDE World Championship 202110.1
Nepomniachtchi,I2782Carlsen,M28550–12021C54FIDE World Championship 202111.1

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Carlos Colodro is a Hispanic Philologist from Bolivia. He works as a freelance translator and writer since 2012. A lot of his work is done in chess-related texts, as the game is one of his biggest interests, along with literature and music.

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