The tournament continues to offer interesting games and lots of decisive results - and not just at the expense of the sub-2700 players. In fact, all of today’s winners and losers were members of the 2700 club.
Anish Giri was surpassed at almost the very last moment in the race for the Candidates when Dommaraju Gukesh’s win in the Chennai Grand Masters vaulted him into the lead for the FIDE Circuit. Gukesh is headed for the Candidates, but Giri took a measure of revenge as he ground his opponent down in a long and painful game. (Let that game be a lesson to you, kids: opposite-colored bishops do not guarantee a draw, even when material is equal, all the pawns are on the same side, and attacking elements are almost completely absent.) Giri is now alone in first with an impressive 3.5/4.
Another winner: Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa, who reeled in the biggest fish, Ding Liren - and did so with the black pieces. It was a good game by Pragg, but an especially bad one for the World Champ, whose 43.f4?/?? was especially bad. The win put Pragg into a four-way tie for third-sixth places, a group that includes the day’s third winner, Wei Yi. He defeated Parham Maghsoodloo in a complicated game that was decided by Maghsoodloo’s 44…Be4?, which left his king stuck and vulnerable on the back rank after 45.Ra7+.
There should have been a fourth win, as Alexander Donchenko was clearly winning (with Black) against Ian Nepomniachtchi, but the game was messy enough that even reaching the safety of the second time control wasn’t enough for Donchenko to work it out.
The other draws were more routine and fairly short, including the draw between Alireza Firouzja and Nodirbek Abdusattorov that resulted in Firouzja’s being in clear second.
Today (Wednesday) is a rest day, and I need it as much as the players do. So here are the round four games, with my comments, and here’s what we have to look forward to on Thursday:
Ju Wenjun (1) - Firouzja (3)
Vidit (2) - Warmerdam (2)
Donchenko (1) - Van Foreest (1.5)
Gukesh (1.5) - Nepomniachtchi (2.5)
Praggnanandhaa (2.5) - Giri (3.5)
Maghsoodloo (.5) - Ding Liren (2)
Abdusattorov (2.5) - Wei Yi (2.5)