2018 World Championship in London

[Barry Sandercock]

Thanks,Christopher. It's working now.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Oh dear. It might end up 3-0 at this rate.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

And Caruana has resigned. 2-0. Difficult to see him coming back now.

[Chris Rice]

Grischuk "We've had three weeks of boredom followed by two hours of terror"

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Caruana possibly regretting his decision to accept the draw in game 12 of the classical phase of the match.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Oh dear. It might end up 3-0 at this rate.

Will be 3-0 unless Magnus the Merciful makes an appearance.

Caruana taking a moment to compose himself before resigning.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Caruana possibly regretting his decision to accept the draw in game 12 of the classical phase of the match.

Regretting his 24th move in game 8, more like

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Yes. That too. Caruana still playing on with Magnus now having two queens... (Caruana really wanted this, I think.)

Oh, he has resigned now. Carlsen retains his title.

[Mike Gunn]

They think it's all over ...

[NickFaulks]

What a washout. After three weeks, we have learned that Carlsen is a better rapid player than Caruana. But we knew that already.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Fair play to Magnus though, this is more decisive than I expected given the previous course of the match.

[Nick Ivell]

I would expect the more talented player to win at skittles. Magnus is the more talented player. But the stronger player? He didn't prove it. They could have played 24 games of classical with no one winning.

All in all an unsatisfactory spectacle, of interest to the connoisseur, but unlikely to bring new recruits to the game.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Full marks to Tim Kett for trying:

Why is this year's World Chess Championship so exciting?

As featured on BBC World Service Newshour

Norwegian title-holder Magnus Carlsen and American challenger Fabiano Caruana will head to a series of fast-paced tie-breakers after drawing in every game of this year's World Chess Championship. Former Welsh chess champion Tim Kett explains why this year's championship has been so exciting.

[Richard Bates]

I would expect the more talented player to win at skittles. Magnus is the more talented player. But the stronger player? He didn't prove it. They could have played 24 games of classical with no one winning.

All in all an unsatisfactory spectacle, of interest to the connoisseur, but unlikely to bring new recruits to the game.

I don't know, I suspect the whole thing was more interesting to the average casual viewer/interest than the established players.

It seems to me that it is a consistent pattern across a wide range of sporting events, that experts/insiders are consistently talking down their own product, often citing those other than themselves as those allegedly being put off by the spectacle offered. Whether it be cricket ("test matches are so boring/complicated to the average fan"), motor racing ("no overtaking"), football (various 0-0 championship finals), cycling ("Team Sky dominance"), golf (…. well OK i'll give you that )

For the casual viewer it really shouldn't be too difficult to build up a narrative of "incredibly closely matched players, tension building up over time, couldn't be separated in normal time, one player finally cracking in the tie breaks etc", should those in charge of advertising the product so choose

[Matt Mackenzie]

All in all an unsatisfactory spectacle, of interest to the connoisseur, but unlikely to bring new recruits to the game.

When was the last WC match that significantly did??