Seven out of eight games in round 1 of the Candidates ended in draws in Toronto, Canada. Former women’s world champion Tan Zhongyi ended up scoring the only win of the day against last year’s women’s Candidates winner and fellow Chinese, Lei Tingjie, to grab sole lead.
In the Candidates – that decides the World Championship challenger – the first round typically can start slow, with players settling in and getting into the rhythm of a long and difficult tournament. All the Indians got home safe but the draws weren’t devoid of moments of beauty, peril and struggle. Playing with the White pieces, Alireza Firouzja appeared to have arrived at the board with some great preparation and took some risks with the curious structure he took on. The French-Iranian Grandmaster had his battles with the clock and was left with under five minutes for 11 moves to make time control.
It did appear as if Black’s pieces were constricted and White’s pieces were aiming at the Black King. Faced with the danger of checkmate on the e-file, Black cut off the route by bringing its knight (32..Ne5) into the line of attack and went on to deliver the perpetual check. Both players hung back at the board for an animated post-mortem after the nervy draw.
The all-Indian opener between D Gukesh and Vidit Gujrathi – who has been handed two blacks in a row – finished in a draw by three-fold repetition.
In the battle between the tournament favourites and top two seeds, Fabiano Caruana seemed disappointed to have let slip a good opportunity against Hikaru Nakamura. Hikaru, perhaps came off the game as the happier guy, extending his unbeaten classical streak to 47 games.
The lowest seed in the tournament, Azerbaijani Nijat Abasov – who tore his ACL during a football match and is playing the tournament in a knee brace – managed to have a good start and played out a draw with the two-time World Championship challenger, Ian Nepomniachtchi
In the women’s section, India’s Vaishali R who’s making her debut in the tournament, waded into a bit of a time scramble but managed to hold her own against senior compatriot Koneru Humpy, in an equal bishop and knight endgame.
Round 1 results:
Open
Fabiano Caruana ½ Hikaru Nakamura
Nijat Abasov ½ Ian Nepomniachtchi
Alireza Firouzja ½ R Praggnanandhaa
D Gukesh ½ Vidit Gujrathi
Women
Alexsandra Goryachkina ½ Kateryna Lagno
Anna Muzychuk ½ Nurgyul Salimova
Lei Tingjie 0-1 Tan Zhongyi
Vaishali R ½ Koneru Humpy
Round 2 pairings:
Open
Hikaru Nakamura vs Vidit Gujrathi
R Praggnanandhaa vs D Gukesh
Ian Nepomniachtchi vs Alireza Firouzja
Fabiano Caruana vs Nijat Abasov
Women
Kateryna Lagno vs Koneru Humpy
Tan Zhongyi vs Vaishali R
Nurgyul Salimova vs Lei Tingjie
Aleksandra Goryachkina vs Anna Muzychuk
Where to watch: Fide YouTube channel
Time: April 5, 14:30 local time in Toronto (April 6 midnight IST)
