Round 11 of the Candidates was the bloodiest one since all the way back to round 2. Then all four games were decisive; in this round, three of the four games finished with a winner.
The first game to finish was Alireza Firouzja’s massacre of Nijat Abasov. Abasov hasn’t had a good tournament, to be sure, having previous lost four games without winning once, but all his losses were typically hard-fought games where he was gradually ground down. Not this time: he was blown off the board in 24 moves and was lost after an error on his 15th move. Abasov’s reaction to Firouzja’s 1.Nf3, 2.b3 wasn’t bad, but when he didn’t play 11…e5 his position grew increasingly awkward. On move 15 he needed to retreat the queen to e6, with a position that was better than it looked. After 15…e5 his position looked decent, but 16.Nc4! forced Black to either surrender a pawn or generate more problems for himself. He chose the latter, and - well, you’ll see the results. Firouzja has played well from round 7 on, but starting with a -3 score after six rounds left him too far behind to catch up.
The second game to finish was the day’s only draw, between Dommaraju Gukesh and Fabiano Caruana. It was Gukesh who was pressing throughout, but as far as I can tell he never missed any big opportunities - which is not to say that Caruana might not have cracked had Gukesh made the most of his relatively minor chances.
Hikaru Nakamura’s comeback continued, this time with a win with Black against Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa. They entered the round tied with each other, half a point behind Ian Nepomniachtchi and Gukesh; now Nakamura has caught Gukesh. (As for Nepo, stay tuned.) Nakamura played the unusual 1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.c4 c5!?, a line that Pragg’s second, Peter Svidler, used against Sergey Karjakin in the World Cup back in 2015. Pragg clearly knew something about it, but understandably wasn’t as prepared as Nakamura was. Nakamura acquired a large lead on the clock and a definite initiative, but Pragg held the balance until his 29th move. White had to play the unobvious 29.Ke1!; instead, 29.Ke3? put White’s king in the firing line, and in the tactical play that followed Pragg wound up losing a piece. He played a while longer, hoping to reach rook vs. rook and bishop, but to no avail. Nakamura converted his advantage very cleanly and is now very much in the hunt for first place, while Praggnanandhaa is almost certainly out of the running for first.
Finally, there’s the most dramatic game of the round, between Santosh Vidit Gujrathi and Nepomniachtchi. Vidit played a completely harmless line against Nepo’s Petroff, and was soon worse; however, Nepo let Vidit off the hook and a very complicated and imbalanced endgame arose. Vidit had a couple of chances to win, but they were difficult and came with Vidit in time trouble near the end of the first time control. The position reached after 40 moves was equal, with both sides having their very different advantages. Vidit refused a repetition, but Nepo played better and took over the initiative. Vidit defended well for a long time, but finally cracked, down to seconds on his clock, with 60.Nb2+. Nepo converted his advantage with practically perfect play; indeed, his play throughout the second time control was almost perfectly accurate. It was a real triumph of resilience and fighting spirit - not to mention generally excellent play - and after six consecutive draws his third win of the event put him back into clear first with three rounds to go.
The games, with my comments, are here; here are the pairings for round 12:
Nakamura (6.5) - Firouzja (4.5)
Abasov (3) - Gukesh (6.5)
Caruana (6) - Vidit (5)
Nepomniachtchi (7) - Praggnanandhaa (5.5)
It should be a very interesting round. Firouzja has been playing better, but Nakamura is playing better still and has the white pieces. Abasov has been tough to beat with White, but still, he’s getting bruised by the field and Gukesh is the stronger player in a nearly must-win situation. Caruana is in a must-win situation, and with White against a possibly downcast Vidit he may a good opportunity to play for a win, provided he gets something from the opening. Finally, while Pragg is no one’s idea of an easy opponent, it would obviously be good for Nepo if he could make something of his penultimate white game, especially with his two closest pursuers having favorable pairings.
One final comment for this post. As important as the event is, several of the players (at least Nakamura, Firouzja, and Vidit) used the “rest” day to play in Titled Tuesday, with Nakamura winning the Late tournament with 10.5/11. That certainly goes against the advice that older generations would give, but it didn’t seem to hurt Firouzja or Nakamura, and even Vidit played well in this round, only losing after a long and bitterly fought struggle against the tournament leader and two-time defending Candidates champion. So there you go, dear readers: play more blitz, even during tournaments.