Thursday, November 22, 2018

Carlsen-Caruana game 10: 0.5-0.5

OK, not to bury the lede: another draw, and the match stands 5-5.

But what a game!

Caruana had the white pieces and the game started very similarly to game 8.

But soon Caruana was pushing his queenside pawns, while Carlsen pushed his kingside pawns, and the result was a very unbalanced and sharp position.

Carlsen offered a pawn sacrifice on move 21, which Caruana declined.

But that barely eased the pressure, as Carlsen's advanced pawns gave Caruana almost no space at all, while Caruana's passed and advanced b6 pawn meant Carlsen was tied down with most of his pieces.

Late in the game, the computers thought that Carlsen had erred, and sure enough at the end Caruana had an extra pawn, but the position was much simplified and he offered the draw on move 54, after 5.5 hours of tight and thrilling chess.

Two games left. Surely the pressure must be IMMENSE at this point, as just a single decisive match will almost certainly decide the outcome.

No comments:

Post a Comment