World Cup: Round 6, Day 3
The Pragg-Erigaisi battle for the last semi-final spot came down to sudden-death...
The battle between friends, countrymen, and fellow teens Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa and Arjun Erigaisi went all the way to the sudden death 3’+2” segment before a winner was decided. They split the classical games on the previous days, with Erigaisi winning game 1 with Black before Pragg won the rematch yesterday. The two 25’+10” games were clean draws, with neither side having any big opportunities. And then: all decisive games until the end of the match.
In the 10’+10”, Erigaisi had a huge - indeed, winning - advantage with White in game 1, but Pragg’s resilience paid off. First Erigaisi gave away the win, and then he went on to lose what had become a difficult rook ending. That must have been demoralizing, but he came right back. His sharp opening choice didn’t give him a good position, but all he needed was something complicated, and he got it. Pragg misjudged the complications when he played 15.a4, and then 18.Qd3 was a further error in a challenging position that led to Erigaisi quickly taking over and winning.
On to the 5’+3” games. Once again Pragg struck first with the black pieces, but this time it wasn’t a miracle save in a lost position. Instead, Erigaisi seemed badly prepared in one of his own pet lines, and after a poor 12th move his position went from somewhat worse to lost. Pragg went on to win convincingly and quickly. The next game was a topsy-turvy affair. Again needing a win with Black to stay alive, Erigaisi got a superior position from the opening, but then the position got so wild that both players made mistakes and the evaluation swung back and forth. On move 25 Pragg missed a winning move, and on move 27 he hallucinated and blundered a rook. He tried to make something of his Erigaisi’s exposed king, but Black quickly consolidated and won.
So, on to the 3’+2” sudden death segment. If a player wins the first game, the match is over; if it’s drawn, the players switch colors and play again; rinse and repeat. It only took one game, and the trend of Black wins (four in a row, and six of eight with no wins for White) was broken. Praggnanandhaa had White, grabbed a sacrificed pawn (I’m not sure Erigaisi thought it was going to be a sacrifice, but that’s how it turned out), and gradually ground his opponent down. It was a very well-played game by Pragg for a 3’+2” game, especially in the extremely high-pressure situation they faced and taking fatigue into consideration as well.
His reward? A semi-final match with Fabiano Caruana today/tomorrow, while Magnus Carlsen will see if he can put down the upstart Nijat Abasov. A reminder: the top three in this tournament automatically qualify for the Candidates. It is generally believed that Carlsen will skip the Candidates (though without ruling it out altogether); if so, then the other three semi-finalists are already guaranteed of qualification. Carlsen himself is essentially guaranteed of a spot no matter how he does, if he wants to play. That’s because even in the unlikely case that he loses to Abasov and then the loser of the Caruana-Pragg match, he will still be the rating qualifier for the Candidates, barring a miracle. Similarly, if Caruana loses two matches and Carlsen decides to play in the Candidates after all, then he (Caruana) will have good chances to be the rating qualifier for the Candidates.
We’ll see what happens. For now, here are today’s games, with my notes to the five that didn’t finish in a draw.