World Cup, Day 18: The Botch(ed) Game

The semifinal round of the World Cup had a somewhat surreal aspect to it. Looking at the games, it seems clear that the players were exhausted. The first two “classical” games were drawn in 14 and 16 moves respectively, as the players took a break from the...

World Cup: Going to the (Under)dogs

We’re down to the final four players now in the World Cup, and it’s a final four that nobody in the world expected. Do you think I’m kidding? Let’s take a look. Evgeny Tomashevsky — 26-year-old Russian grandmaster, according to Wikipedia...

World Cup Day 12 — Unbelievable Tiebreaker

The fourth-round matches in the World Cup are complete, and again they were full of surprises and unbelievably nerve-wracking chess. To briefly summarize a long and sometimes agonizing day, the winners were Dmitry Andreikin (a surprise winner over Sergey Karjakin),...