English Chess Forum

They're not going to do that though: the players aren't going to want to add another two to three weeks for nothing in return.

"An alternative that doesn't give the holder draw odds would be to play the tie breaks first. One player would then know they had to win the main match and would presumably take increasingly large risks to do so as the match progressed."

My father suggested that for football as it would have stopped both sides playing for a draw for the last half-hour. You would still have one side doing it though.

Carlsen and Nepo are both quite good, so you would expect a lot of draws. At least the games have been fairly long, so they are trying, not just giving up after 20 moves or fewer.

The main problem as I see it (between closely matched opponents) is basically the length of matches, but there doesn’t seem to be any appetite to change significantly. They severely mitigate against the type of risk taking needed to produce wins at this level.

Traditionally, for obvious reasons, the first 4-5 (or more!) games are generally cagey with each side trying to ascertain the sort of openings and positions that their opponent has primarily concentrated on in their preparation.

The last few games (unless influenced by the sort of tiredness produced by a long match) are too close to the finish to take too many risks, when one loss could cost it all.

Which only leaves a handful of games in the middle to actually do something. At a point when most players will probably still be comfortably operating within their primary or backup opening choices and pre-match opening preparation.

The outcomes we get are hardly surprising in that context.

What a game we have today -tough endgame.

they get credit for this game, at any rate. It is true they would likely have played earlier games to the finish too if there had been any interest or possibility of doing so, but still, five games without much interest was unfortunate.

Hard to know what to make of having 14 games instead of 12. Arguably the best games of Kramnik v Leko were 13 and 14 when big Vlad woke up and made one last big effort to retain his title. But perhaps if there had been 12 games he would have played like that in games 11 and 12. I'd be curious to know how people remember that match; for the mind numbing games 1-11, alleviated mainly by Kramnik's underprepared queen sac in the lopez in game 8, or for games 13 and 14; and overall?

e4 109 moves late

The 124 move record is clearly at risk.

This ending must be tablebased surely?

draw apparently

Which is maybe slightly surprising, but I suppose with best play Black can create enough checks/threats.

This is now the longest game in World Championship history, overtaking the 124 moves of game 5 in the 1978 Karpov v Korchnoi match.

The game enters the second day.

Jonathan Rogers wrote: ↑

Fri Dec 03, 2021 7:29 pm

they get credit for this game, at any rate. It is true they would likely have played earlier games to the finish too if there had been any interest or possibility of doing so, but still, five games without much interest was unfortunate.

Hard to know what to make of having 14 games instead of 12. Arguably the best games of Kramnik v Leko were 13 and 14 when big Vlad woke up and made one last big effort to retain his title. But perhaps if there had been 12 games he would have played like that in games 11 and 12. I'd be curious to know how people remember that match; for the mind numbing games 1-11, alleviated mainly by Kramnik's underprepared queen sac in the lopez in game 8, or for games 13 and 14; and overall?

I remember Kramnik v Leko for the first game, which was anything but mind numbing, and the ending of which (2R v Q) could well have been repeated today, had Ian allowed it, and for the final game.

Matthew Turner wrote: ↑

Fri Dec 03, 2021 7:55 pm

draw apparently

but not any more

Table base now winning for Magnus