Madrid Candidates 16th June to Tue 5th Jul 2022

[Matt Mackenzie]

If we counted the freebies that Larsen and Taimanov handed Fischer...

Well indeed, but the continuing allure of those results is the perfect 6-0 scores - never achieved before or since which alone says it all.

[JustinHorton]

And Nepo wins again.

Destroying another candidate with the awesome ultra aggressive power of ... The Petroff Defence

If we counted the freebies that Larsen and Taimanov handed Fischer...

Well indeed, but the continuing allure of those results is the perfect 6-0 scores - never achieved before or since which alone says it all.

Sure but maybe we should also bear in mind that Nepo was what, fourth favourite at best for this tournament?

[JustinHorton]

Sensational performance from Ding.

[Angus French]

And Nepo wins again.

Destroying another candidate with the awesome ultra aggressive power of ... The Petroff Defence

If we counted the freebies that Larsen and Taimanov handed Fischer...

Well indeed, but the continuing allure of those results is the perfect 6-0 scores - never achieved before or since which alone says it all.

Sure but maybe we should also bear in mind that Nepo was what, fourth favourite at best for this tournament?

Too much emphasis on (current) ratings and not enough on experience and past performance?

[Jonathan Bryant]

Sensational performance from Ding.

Yes.

I find the aggro that Firouzja got for playing bullet until 5am this morning (apparently) curious, though. Well not so much that he was criticized for it. More that there wasn't anything like the same amount of comment on Ding only showing up just before the event started. Pretty much the same thing, it seems to me.

[Jonathan Bryant]

Sure but maybe we should also bear in mind that Nepo was what, fourth favourite at best for this tournament?

Too much emphasis on (current) ratings and not enough on experience and past performance?

I was definitely one of those that didn't put him in the top three favourites before things kicked off. Or even after round 1.

It wasn't so much an emphasis on ratings as a question mark in my mind as to how much he would really want to win the thing. Evidently I got that one totally wrong.

Certainly the general over-rating of Firouzja's chances by definition would have led to an underrating of Nepo's.

And I say that about Firouzja not with the benefit of hindsight as I really didn't see him finishing in the top few this time around - although I have to admit I certainly didn't expect him to endi up bottom or next to it either.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

So does Ding still have a chance to overhaul Nepo? And about Firouzja, didn't Fischer do badly in his first attempts in the WC qualification cycle, or am I thinking of someone else? Firouzja may need more time.

[JustinHorton]

Strictly speaking everybody down to Radjabov still has a chance to overhaul Nepo.

By the way, am I right in thinking this is the first time in modern Candidates history that a player has reached +5?

[Geoff Chandler]

A Nakamura win in the next round will spice things up.

Here are the final rounds. Some juicy 'what if' permutations there.
But for Nepo not to come first or second it's looking like he will need to lose all three games.
I was trying to figure who had the easiest run in, but these are all good players and, as we
have already seen, anything can happen.

Round 12 (1 July 2022)
Richárd Rapport (4½) – Fabiano Caruana (5½)
Ding Liren (6½) – Teimour Radjabov (5)
Jan-Krzysztof Duda (4½) – Alireza Firouzja (4)
Ian Nepomniachtchi (8) – Hikaru Nakamura (6)

Round 13 (3 July 2022)
Ian Nepomniachtchi – Richárd Rapport
Hikaru Nakamura – Jan-Krzysztof Duda
Alireza Firouzja – Ding Liren
Teimour Radjabov – Fabiano Caruana

Round 14 (4 July 2022)
Richárd Rapport – Teimour Radjabov
Fabiano Caruana – Alireza Firouzja
Ding Liren – Hikaru Nakamura
Jan-Krzysztof Duda – Ian Nepomniachtchi

[Matt Mackenzie]

Caruana's collapse since the half way point certainly isn't what many were predicting.

[Jonathan Bryant]

... , didn't Fischer do badly in his first attempts in the WC qualification cycle ...

Indeed. That was one of the reasons why I thought Firouzja was unlikely to be a leading contender.

Depends how you define ‘badly’ but Fischer certainly wasn’t successful.

1959: 5th/6th out of 8 with Gligoric.
1962: 4th out of 8.


People forget that Carlsen only just sneaked through in his first - and only - candidates tournament. If Ivanchuk hadn’t suddenly showed up in the last round. Beating Kramnik after chunky had buggered about the entire time before then - Kramnik would have won and ended up playing Anand again

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Heh, thanks Jonathan. I had thought of mentioning Carlsen's thrilling win in his first Candidates. I won't forget that in a hurry as I was fortunate enough to have been one of the spectators that day (the money spent going to all rounds of that Candidates was well spent and well worth it).

The most exciting permutation (though unlikely) is the one with Nakamura, Ding and Nepo going into the final round tied on 8/13.

[Matt Mackenzie]

... , didn't Fischer do badly in his first attempts in the WC qualification cycle ...

Indeed. That was one of the reasons why I thought Firouzja was unlikely to be a leading contender.

Depends how you define ‘badly’ but Fischer certainly wasn’t successful.

1959: 5th/6th out of 8 with Gligoric.
1962: 4th out of 8.


People forget that Carlsen only just sneaked through in his first - and only - candidates tournament. If Ivanchuk hadn’t suddenly showed up in the last round. Beating Kramnik after chunky had buggered about the entire time before then - Kramnik would have won and ended up playing Anand again

Well in the very midst of that "b***ering about" he did manage to beat Carlsen with Black, remember.

Kramnik's choice of the Pirc for that last game was rather questionable too.

[Mick Norris]

TWIC

Ian Nepomniachtchi won his fifth game of the Candidates beating Alireza Firouzja in the eleventh round of the FIDE Candidates in Madrid. The story of this game even early on was that Firouzja was up all night playing hyper bullet 30 second chess on the Internet. I'm afraid his reckless play today showed all the signs of him doing precisely that. 16.g4 is dubious, 17.h4? is bad and 18.g5 leaves white flat lost. Of course it required skill from Nepomniachtchi to make the refutation look easy but the in form Russian had no problems whatsoever. Nepomniachtchi is still in complete control of the tournament three draws, likely only two, will win him the event.

Caruana fled the playing hall, I could not feel sorrier for him. He's put far more effort and moves into this event than anyone else and it's been too much - some of that's been bad luck, some of that's been the kinds of battles he's chosen to play. He's World Class but he needs to find a different way to fight the next Candidates. Now Ding is in clear second place, first place looks out of reach but second may be enough for a title match if Carlsen doesn't play as previously discussed.

[Paul Cooksey]

It does seem this tournament has favoured those who have been more solid and waited for chances than those who have tried to make something happen. But I suppose that is common for candidates, both modern and historic.