[Event "FIDE World Championship"] [Site "Dubai UAE"] [Date "2021.12.07"] [Round "9"] [White "Nepomniachtchi, Ian"] [Black "Carlsen, Magnus"] [Result "0-1"] [WhiteElo "2782"] [BlackElo "2855"] [Annotator "Shabalov"] [Variant "Standard"] [ECO "A13"] [Opening "English Opening: Agincourt Defense"] [Source "https://lichess.org/study/1NIB7sSp/j6ZeRee2"] [Orientation "white"] { After the media storm that was caused by the previous game subsided, two major news items came to light on early Tuesday morning. First: the "minister of defense," GM Sergey Karjakin, was summoned back to Dubai from snowbound Moscow. Second: Nepo's fashionable man-bun was gone. Immediately the internet gave Sergey a new nickname - the "Barber of Crimea," a reference to a famous Russian Academy Award nominated movie from 1998, "The Barber of Siberia." } { [%evp 0,42,24,-12,-9,-40,-20,-23,4,3,-18,8,38,42,6,4,5,5,1,28,29,26,30,24,45, 32,-7,13,8,28,9,5,-7,-7,-10,-11,0,15,14,-28,0,16,24,15,32] } 1. c4 { Karjakin appears to have brought a clear message: forget about anything and just play chess! Great advice from Karjakin, who apparently is the only person Nepo is listening to, setting up this game for a promising start. } 1... e6 2. g3 d5 3. Bg2 d4 { Magnus does not want to play against preparation, a bit of wisdom he acquired from his previous match experiences, but in this case, he suffers a bit for it. } 4. Nf3 Nc6 5. O-O Bc5 { Another strange looking decision, but it guarantees that we will have an original position. As with most of the games of this match, Magnus carefully choses his opening moves, while Ian is blitzing. } 6. d3 Nf6 7. Nbd2 a5 8. Nb3 Be7 { Nepo's fast tempo confused Magnus into playing this illogical move. What's the problem? We have a Benoni structure with the colors reversed, where two extra tempos for White should be enough for him to equalize and maybe grab a little initiative. But all the previous Black moves (5...Bc5 and 7... a5) assumed that dark-squared bishop will stay on the a7-g1 diagonal; otherwise, why not castle instead of playing . ..a5? Now Black's position is starting to turn demonstrably worse. } 9. e3 dxe3 10. Bxe3 Ng4 { Surprisingly the best continuation in the position. } (10... O-O 11. Nbd4 Bd7 12. Nb5 { would lead to a grim position with a very little chance of counterplay. }) 11. Bc5 { This is better than } (11. d4 Nxe3 12. fxe3 O-O 13. Nbd2 { where Black's two bishops completely compensate for his lack of space. }) 11... O-O 12. d4 { For the first time in the current match Nepo spent "more than 3 minutes" on his move here. Expectations were really high at this moment. } 12... a4 13. Bxe7 Qxe7 14. Nc5 a3 15. bxa3?! { A real "Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper" moment, showing me that Nepo simply does not have any idea about what it takes to beat Magnus. High level chess has really changed from what it was 20-30 years ago -- ok, I understand that. But I'm trying to even imagine Tal, Kasparov, or Anand playing b2xa3 here, and with the same speed you would play a move onTitled Tuesday. It's not not possible. Of course, I understand that we may be dealing with a broken man here, but to me, the problems run much deeper. Here we come to the most critical position in this game, and I can't help but go through another rant. White has to choose between two continuations: 15.bxa3 and 15.b4!?. } (15. b3 { is wrong on principle. The a3 pawn, coupled with the black knight on b4, will give Black additional chances in the endgame. Nepo's continuatiation is not bad objectively, but there are two drawbacks that completely erase its chess value. First 15.b4!? fits Nepo style much more. Second, if at a match score of -2 your choice is a safer continuation, you are angering the chess gods. Their punishment will come, swift and inevitable. }) (15. b4 Nxb4 { practically forced. } (15... Rd8 16. Qb3 Nxd4 17. Nxd4 Rxd4 18. Rad1 { is not a concern for white. }) 16. Rb1 Nc6 (16... Nxa2 17. Qd2) (16... b6!? 17. Rxb4 bxc5 18. Rb5 cxd4? (18... Ra6 19. Rxc5 Bb7 20. Qd3 Nf6 21. Qe3) 19. Nxd4 $18) (16... Na6 17. Nxb7 Ra7 18. Na5 Nb4 19. c5 Rxa5 20. Rxb4 $16) 17. Nxb7 Rb8 18. Na5!! { Maybe this what escaped Ian's calculation? Well, one might think that what Ian spent almost 20 minutes on move 12. Think again. Maybe he was lamenting his fashion decision earlier in the day instead. Hopefully we'll get some clarification later. }) 15... Rd8 16. Nb3 Nf6 17. Re1 Qxa3 18. Qe2 { White clearly retains a certain pressure. But the lightness in Nepo's decisions visibly came back as he started to blitz out his (far from obvious) moves again. } 18... h6 19. h4 Bd7 20. Ne5 Be8 21. Qe3 { Really? Is it so obvious that 1 minute spent on it is enough? } 21... Qb4 22. Reb1? { Nepo starts to play against Magnus' clock instead of looking at the position. A lot of White's pre-blunder decisions in this game may be objectively fine, but they are in complete dissonance with the match situation and also with a human understanding of the game. For example, there were different lines where White tries to go for g4-g5 while the black queen is stuck on the other side of the board. Some very interesting lines could have emerged if Nepo had tried take that route, but I see very little reason to discuss any of them. Attacking Magnus' king was clearly not on Ian's agenda. } (22. Bxc6 Bxc6 23. g4!?) 22... Nxe5 23. dxe5 Ng4 24. Qe1 { It took Ian one minute to see that he wins a pawn in this line. Congrats, he is a speed demon. But if he'd spent another minute to assess the consequences, he'd realize that he cannot hold on to it. } 24... Qxe1+ 25. Rxe1 h5 26. Bxb7 Ra4 27. c5?? { And here is the message from above. } (27. f3 Nh6 28. Be4 Rxc4 29. Rec1 Ra4 30. Rxc7 Nf5 { would be a logical continuation with White even retaining the extra pawn, although without real chances to convert it. The black pieces are lining up well against the passed a-pawn. }) 27... c6 { Nepo's explanation during the press conference was that he forgot that he needs the c5-square for his knight in order to save the bishop. Unfortunately for him, this blunder ends game immediately. After he realized what he just did, he left the stage and was absent for about 20 minutes. He definitely was in a very dark place during that time. } 28. f3 Nh6 29. Re4 Ra7 30. Rb4 Rb8 31. a4 Raxb7 32. Rb6 Rxb6 33. cxb6 Rxb6 34. Nc5 Nf5 35. a5 Rb8 36. a6 Nxg3! { Magnus confidence is through the roof right now, and even with relatively short time remaining he chooses a more energetic continuation instead of the safe } (36... Nd4 37. Kf2 Nb5) 37. Na4 c5 38. a7 Rd8 39. Nxc5 Ra8 { The match is over. Ian vowed not to give up and play some fun chess for the remainder of the event. We all hope that this is the case. Perhaps Karjakin should introduce some new routines for him, like sitting on his hands, or taking another minute after deciding on a move before making it on the board. The next game is tomorrow, so let's hope we catch a glimpse of what this match really could have been. } 0-1