Superbet, Super Bet, and Super Best
What's happening, what won't be happening, and what will be happening.
Let’s start with Superbet, the elite tournament taking place in Bucharest, Romania. Monday was a rest day, and after round 6 on Tuesday Fabiano Caruana continues to lead, with three players nipping at his heels: Gukesh Dommaraju, Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, and the day’s only winner, Alireza Firouzja. (The games, with my mostly very brief comments, are here.) Three rounds remain.
What won’t be happening is the bet-a-million event I mentioned in the preceding post. The plan was for Caruana, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, and Hans Niemann to play some rapid games, each contributing $1 million to the pot. The initial report was that the first three had secured funding and it was up to Niemann to put up or shut up; for whatever reason, the event seems to have fallen through. More - but not much more - here (look for the Hans Niemann tweet just a bit below his picture).
A hat-tip to Allen Becker for that link, and also for beating others and my own browsing to the punch in reporting that this fall’s World Championship match between Gukesh and Ding Liren - assuming he’ll play (and given the prize fund, I expect he will) - will take place in Singapore. (More here.)