Aronian vs. Andreikin in the Speed Chess Championship
A thriller that came down to the wire.
The round of 16 for the Chess.com Speed Chess Championship is still underway, with four of the eight matches yet to come. (Next up: Gukesh D vs. Magnus Carlsen, on Tuesday; Nihal Sarin vs. Anish Giri on Wednesday; finally, both Wesley So vs. Nodirbek Abdusattorov and Hikaru Nakamura vs. David Paravyan will be this Thursday.) So far, the fourth match, between Levon Aronian and Dmitry Andreikin, has been the best. The games were interesting, and both players were resilient not only within particular games but psychologically as well, overcoming setbacks without tilting. The match went back and forth, and was only decided in the very last game, in overtime.
What happened? I’ll put the final score in the comments, but recommend that you have a look at the video of the match, if you can spare the time, and see for yourself. And to whet your appetite, here (with my notes) is game four of this match, a rock ‘em sock ‘em draw with both sides attacking and missing chances to win within a single, crazy 30-move draw.
Aronian won, 15-14, winning the last two games of the playoff. He also needed to make a remarkable comeback to force the playoff, especially entering the 1'+1" segment down three points after losing the last five games of the 3'+1" segment.