Carlsen's challenger before 2020?

[Leonard Barden]

My recent Guardian article predicting Wei Yi as a Magnus Carlsen challenger within five years http://www.theguardian.com/sport/2015/m ... ars-at-top
got a record 275 shares, so I guess it might interest the Forum.

He will be 16 on 2 June, and has been roughly keeping pace with Carlsen and Kasparov at that age, though slightly behind Fischer who aged 16.1 at Zurich 1959 was contesting first with Tal until a few rounds from the end.

This week Wei Yi is playing in the Chinese Championship http://www.qipai.org.cn/web/topic/cchll ... 99uchcfkd4

and is currently sole leader on 3.5/4. The big game was this morning (rounds start 6.30 am BST) when he beat China's No1 and world No13 Ding Liren in the Ruy Lopez Berlin Wall.

The game follows Caruana v Grischuk, European teams 2013, until Ding's 16...b6 varies from 16...Re8 17 Bf4 in the Caruana game. So it looks as if Wei Yi's new anti-Berlin idea is to put the rook at f3 to induce the passive Be8, then develop the c1 bishop at b2 rather than f4 to support the K-side pawns. However, the computer says that Ding blundered with 31...Rd2+ and that instead Rf8 leads to a draw.

Wei Yi has this morning risen to world No27 and is rated 2728 in the live ratings, leaping over Vachier-Lagrave who is in freefall at the Grand Prix. Ding Liren is a three-time Chinese champion with his first win at age 17, so that's the record to beat.

Wei Yi's only draw so far is with another favourite, Yu Yangyi, and he still has to meet Wang Hao. The rest of the Chinese 2700s, Wang Yue, Li Chao, and Ni Hua, aren't playing, nor is Bu Xiangzhi.

[Jonathan Rogers]

very interesting; thanks for sharing, Leonard.

[Leonard Barden]

Seems nobody else here is following the Chinese championship, but I am doing so with rapt attention.

Just now in today's round Wei Yi had an amazing stroke of luck. He overpressed with White in a f4 Pirc against the No10 seed Liu Qingnan (2523) and was a pawn down with only nebulous compensation. In severe mutual time trouble they reached Ka1 Qe1 Rf2 Bh6 Ps a2 c2 c3 g4 h3 v Kg8 Qb5 Rd6 Ng6 Ps a7 b7 e7 e6 g5 h7 Wei Yi, who is having trouble in this tournament in putting away lower rated opponents, should bail out for a draw by 1 Qf1 but instead went 1 Rd2?? when Rb6 Qc1 Qc4 should win for Black.

Instead Black went 2...Rxd2?? 3 Qxe6+ 1-0 because of Kh8 4 Qc8+ and mates. So good players are always lucky, but super-prodigies even luckier.

Wei Yi now leads the Chinese championship on 5/6 with five rounds left. He is world No27 at age 15 and, should it matter, is 2728 in the live ratings, above the 2725 mark required for a candidates tournament wildcard.

I'm sorry I can't do diagrams but perhaps Roger, Chris or some other kind soul will do it for me.

[IM Jack Rudd]

6k1/pp2p2p/3rp1nB/1q4p1/6P1/2P4P/P1P2R2/K3Q3

[IM Jack Rudd]

(To create a diagram, you write {pos}Position in Forsyth Notation{/pos}, only with square brackets instead of curly ones.)

[Martin Crichton]

why limit oneself to specific Chinese individuals? I predict that there will be a Chinese mens world champion by or before the end of 2020.

I remember reading a book titled "Kevin Wickers 200 modern brilliances" several years ago..... there was 1 game in it where an unknown Chinese player had a win against a GM....Kevin Wicker thought it was amazing but predicted that it might not be too long before China had a GM of their own given the size of their population!

Now China is the number 3 chess nation on the planet. It is inconcievable in my opinion that they won't have a chess champion of the world in the not too distant future.

(I know that most GM'S under 2700 dread playing in events where there are Chinese players entered because they are usually vastly underrated)

[IM Jack Rudd]

[Event "Buenos Aires Olympiad"] [Site "Buenos Aires"] [Date "1978.10.25"] [Round "8"] [White "Liu Wenzhe"] [Black "Jan Hein Donner"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "B07"] [WhiteElo "2200"] [BlackElo "2490"] [PlyCount "39"] [WhiteTeam "China"] [BlackTeam "Netherlands"] [BlackTitle "GM"] 1. e4 d6 2. d4 Nf6 3. Nc3 g6 4. Be2 Bg7 5. g4 h6 6. h3 c5 7. d5 O-O 8. h4 e6 9. g5 hxg5 10. hxg5 Ne8 11. Qd3 exd5 12. Nxd5 Nc6 13. Qg3 Be6 14. Qh4 f5 15. Qh7+ Kf7 16. Qxg6+ Kxg6 17. Bh5+ Kh7 18. Bf7+ Bh6 19. g6+ Kg7 20. Bxh6+ 1-0

[Matt Mackenzie]

Liu previously, in that event, beat the Icelandic GM Sigurjonsson.

Afterwards, a fellow GM gently taunted the loser "tell me, how can a grandmaster LOSE to a Chinaman?"

That person was, of course, one J H Donner

[Mick Norris]

Wei Yi wins with 7.5/11 despite a final round loss

ch-CHN 2015 Xinghua CHN Mon 18th May 2015 - Fri 29th May 2015
Leading Final Round 11 Standings:
Rk SNo Name FED Rtg Pts TB1 TB2 TB3
1 12 Wei Yi CHN 2718 7.5 0.0 40.00 5
2 8 Ding Liren CHN 2757 7.0 0.0 35.75 4
3 11 Wang Hao CHN 2710 6.5 0.5 33.00 3
4 7 Yu Yangyi CHN 2723 6.5 0.5 31.75 4
5 5 Zhao Jun CHN 2613 6.0 1.0 33.75 3
6 2 Zhou Jianchao CHN 2589 6.0 1.0 29.75 2
7 10 Wen Yang CHN 2583 6.0 1.0 29.25 3
8 6 Lu Shanglei CHN 2606 5.5 0.0 29.75 3
9 3 Lin Chen CHN 2460 4.0 1.5 21.00 1
10 9 Liu Qingnan CHN 2523 4.0 1.0 18.75 3
11 1 Wan Yunguo CHN 2472 4.0 0.5 20.50 2
12 4 Wang Chen CHN 2536 3.0 0.0 17.75 1

[Carl Hibbard]

Looks like Leonard knows his stuff!

[Chris Rice]

Well Wei Yi did the business and continues to improve. Will he be the challenger in 2020? Digging back through an old thread discussing a challenger to Carlsen after the first Anand match. I remembered that I had actually predicted Wei Yi to be a challenger in five years time on November 26 2013 so I've still got a couple of years till 2018 for that to happen though Leonard's suggestion that its likely to happen in the cycle after that is probably more realistic.
Also on that old thread there were some other interesting predictions as to who might be Carlsen's next challenger and for example you can see that the late Colin Crouch predicted in 2013 that in 2015 it would be Nakamura and he could still be right couldn't he? Unfortunately Matt McKenzie predicted that if he was the next challenger he would probably get slaughtered by Carlsen and he could be right about that too.

http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=6082

[Matt Mackenzie]

It would be nice if he could win just *one* classical game against Carlsen before playing him in a WC match, yeah

(Naka's admirers have taken to citing the stat that Fischer had never beaten Spassky before 1972 - hmmmm)

[Mick Norris]

Wei Yi v Carlsen

Prodigy watch

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Fascinating article. Since it mentions Wei Yi will be playing in the World Cup, is anyone brave enough to take a punt on Wei Yi doing well enough there to qualify for the Candidates, to win that, and be challenging Carlsen even earlier than expected? Or is that expecting too much of a 16 year old? It is interesting to look back at Carlsen's early forays in the World Cups and World Championship cycles and think what might have been. It is entirely likely that Carlsen is a better player and a more balanced individual for *not* achieving too much too early, but one day you will get a prodigy who goes all the way and wins the title at the first attempt.

[Chris Rice]

Graph showing Wei Yi is possibly ahead of Carlsen at his age plus a prediction from Danny Gormally that Wei Yi will be world number one in three years time. https://twitter.com/TarjeiJS/status/606 ... 80/photo/1