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Rapport Richard wins the FIDE Grand Prix 2022

ChessTournament
Rapport Richard wins the FIDE Grand Prix

On the first day of the final in the second leg of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix in Belgrade, Russian GM Dmitry Andreikin and Hungarian GM Richard Rapport played a solid, correct draw. After his dramatic last-round win of the pool play against GM Etienne Bacrot of France and his intense semifinal against GM Anish Giri, a match that stretched into a third day, featuring a rapid-play tiebreaker, it is hard to fault Andreikin for wanting a more careful start to the final, even if it would cost a draw with the white pieces.
Rapport, in kind, also did not want to take any unnecessary risks, certainly aware that a win in this event will put him in a great position for a spot in this summer's Candidates Tournament in Madrid. As far as Andreikin's ambitions for a spot in the Candidates Tournament, he needed to win here, as his pool in the Grand Prix's third leg starts in Berlin in less than two weeks and includes both Hikaru Nakamura and Levon Aronian, the winner and the runner-up from the first leg of the Grand Prix, which took place in Berlin in February.
In today's game of the final, Rapport had the white pieces and played solidly. Just as the game seemed destined to end with a draw by repetition, Rapport gambled hard with very little time left on the clock and was rewarded with a couple of sub-par moves by Andreikin and, suddenly, White was winning, easily parrying Andreikin's desperate attempt at a perpetual check at the end.
With the win in hand, Richard Rapport looks like a strong favorite to make it to the Candidates tournament as one of the two qualifiers from the Grand Prix. Andreikin, on the other hand, will have to get himself emotionally ready for the third leg, which starts on March 24, 2022.
How to watch?

You can follow the games of the 2022 FIDE Grand Prix on our Events page. Chess.com is providing daily commentary on Chess.com/TV, Twitch, and YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHEbZwTCS7I
Thus far, Rapport has played both 1.e4, 1.d4, and 1.c4 in this event, making guessing his pick for opening choice a little challenging. Though it should be said that he only used 1.c4, the English Opening, when he needed a draw to win his group. Ultimately, in this game, easily one of the most important of his entire career to date, he settled for 1.d4, which Andreikin answered with 1...d5 and followed up with the trendy 3...a6, which Andreikin also essayed in his game against GM Sam Shankland in the pool play of this event. That game ended in a relatively effortless draw for Black. Rapport very quickly steered away from previous games by choosing 5.a3 (Shankland chose 5.Nf3), a move that had only been played in a few encounters between much lower-rated opponents.
Andreikin seemed unafraid of taking some strategical risks, accepting an isolated d-pawn for active piece play. The middlegame continued with a complex but roughly balanced struggle where Black's active pieces compensated for a somewhat vulnerable pawn structure and a slightly vulnerable king.

A win with white in Sunday’s second game of the final gave Richard Rapport tournament victory at the second leg of the FIDE Grand Prix in Belgrade. Rapport beat Dmitry Andreikin after rejecting a draw by triple repetition in a double-edged position. This victory, combined with his reaching the semifinals in the first leg of the series, places him as a clear favourite to get a spot in the Candidates Tournament. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kXqgZ7XLkk

SOURCE: https://www.chess.com/news/view/2022-fide-grand-prix-belgrade-final-day-2-rapport-wins , https://en.chessbase.com/post/fide-grand-prix-2022-leg-2-f2