Tata Steel, Round 4

Pragg in clear first, Erigaisi tied for last.

What were the odds at the start of the tournament that Arjun Erigaisi would have -3 after 4 rounds? It’s hard to believe that the world’s #4 player - still, despite losing 19.4 rating points! - could get off to such an awful start, but even 2800 players have bad days. He’ll be back. His latest woe came against Vladimir Fedoseev. Erigaisi had built up a crushing attack but went for the wrong capture on f5, missing a brutal fork at the end of the line. That was a big point for both players, and for Fedoseev it took him to +1 and part of a tie for third.

Indian fans are undoubtedly disappointed by Erigaisi’s showing so far, but on the other hand Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu is the clear leader, on +3, after defeating Leon Mendonca. Pragg won smoothly, achieving an advantage on the white side of a comparatively rare line in the Ruy that quickly grew decisive in the early middlegame. Mendonca made it to the endgame, though there was never any real hope he might save it. Pragg is alone in first, while Mendonca is tied with Erigaisi in the cellar.

Only half a point out of that last-place tie is Max Warmerdam, who got lost in a tactical queenless middlegame against Pentala Harikrishna. With his second win of the event, Harikrishna joined the tie for third.

Alone in second place is Nodirbek Abdusattorov, who had some advantage against Wei Yi but couldn’t maintain it. The other three games were drawn as well, leaving Fabiano Caruana, Gukesh Dommaraju, and Vincent Keymer in the big tie for third place.

Here are the round 4 games, with my notes (to some of them), and here are the pairings for round 5, after which the players will get their first rest day:

Mendonca (.5) - Erigaisi (.5)

Warmerdam (1) - Praggnanandhaa (3.5)

Wei Yi (2) - Harikrishna (2.5)

Van Foreest (1.5) - Abdusattorov (3)

Gukesh (2.5) - Keymer (2.5)

Giri (1.5) - Sarana (2)

Fedoseev (2.5) - Caruana (2.5)