STAVANGER: The genius of Magnus Carlsen was in full display as he bested D Gukesh after four hours and change on day one of Norway Chess on Monday.
For all money, it had seemed like the draw was going to be the only result even if the five-time world champion had lobbed several grenades in the opening exchanges. He picked a lesser-spotted variation — usually played at club according to the commentators — and slowly but surely started asking questions of the world champion.
To be fair to Gukesh, he had answered most of the questions with a series of precise moves. But when push came to shove, the Norwegian did what he does best. Squeezing water out of stone in a drawn endgame.
The Indian, who prides himself in calculating moves till the end of the line, made an error after queening with his h pawn in the 45th move. Carlsen did likewise his f pawn. The Indian teen, according to the engines, had to start the checks with Rg2. But he instead moved the freshly minted queen to h6. The engines jumped in favour of Carlsen.
He still needed to do one move to kind of consolidate this advantage. He found that move with Kc2. This was the beginning of the end even if Gukesh soldiered on with five more checks in as many moves.
Carlsen, though, allowed his intuition to take over where he married with deadly accuracy with super fast moves (both players had mere seconds on the clock on multiple occasions).
Just as Carlsen was threatening checkmate, Gukesh shook hands knowing that there was no point in continuing to play.
This match kind of showed the distance the Indian has to still travel to beat Carlsen in Classical. This match also kind of showed why the Norwegian five-time champ is continued to be held in such a high regard, even in a format such as this.
The result could once again reignite the talk Surrounding Gukesh’s world title from a wide perspective.
Less than an hour after winning the World Championship in Singapore, Gukesh refused to acknowledge the significance of the title in relation to staking his claim to be the best in the world. “This does not mean I’m the best player in the world,” he had said in the post-tournament press conference. “Obviously, that’s Magnus.
“Would love to test myself against Magnus,” the Indian had continued. “I want to reach the level of greatness that Magnus has achieved.”
Hours after Gukesh’s challenge, the Norwegian simply said ‘I’m not part of the circus,’ thus closing the door on qualifying for the Candidates and potentially setting up a Championship match.
Given that Carlsen, the current World No. 1 in Classical, will not put himself through the rigours of World Championship cycle, it’s safe to say that that tie will never happen.
