For those who were afraid that a final match between Magnus Carlsen and Hans Niemann would have resulted in a Carlsen forfeit, there’s good news: that match isn’t going to happen. Carlsen advanced, but Niemann didn’t, and so the rest of the tournament ought to be free of any intrigue not involving chess moves.
As mentioned above, Carlsen advanced, defeating Levon Aronian 3-1. Aronian took advantage of a serious error by Carlsen on move 30, and while Carlsen had some slight drawing chances later on it was a well-deserved victory by the U.S.’s latest and greatest (imported) super-GM. Unfortunately, that was the end of the pro-Aronian celebration. Opening blunders in games 2 and 3 gave Carlsen a 2-1 lead, and game 4 was headed for a draw until a desperate Aronian took one risk too many.
Carlsen will play Vincent Keymer, who won a tough match against Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa. Keymer won an exciting first game, and after a pair of draws it looked like the match was headed to a blitz playoff, as Pragg achieved a winning advantage. Unfortunately for the young Indian, his 38.Qc2?? flipped the evaluation from winning to losing, and four moves later it was over. Like Carlsen, Keymer triumphed by a 3-1 margin.
Arjun Erigaisi finished second in the preliminaries and faced Christopher Yoo; on paper, that should have been an easy triumph for the much higher-rated Erigaisi. The reality was very different. Erigaisi won the first game and the third game, but Yoo struck back in games 2 and 4 to force a playoff. Once again Erigaisi won his white game, and it was only in game 6 that someone - in this case, Erigaisi - held with Black. He drew, and won the match by a hair, 3.5-2.5.
As for Niemann, it was a tough match against Le Quang Liem. Le won the first game, and Niemann struck back in game 2. Le had a winning attack in that game, but some errors by Le and great defense by Niemann turned things around, and Niemann tied the match. Game 3 was a clean draw, and so it came down to game 4. Le won a good game after Niemann’s erroneous 19…Qb7, and so he’ll face Erigaisi in the bottom half of the bracket.
All the games, with varying degrees of comment, are here.