Magnus Carlsen, who determined towards defending his championship title within the classical format, performed within the Norwegian Workforce League as we speak towards David Howell, which was his final sport earlier than the Nepomniachtchi-Liren match takes place to find out his successor. Carlsen, who nonetheless tops the score chats, performed out a draw with David Howell in an easy sport.
Carlsen’s final sport as a world champion: Black items towards David Howell
The Norwegian confronted a great good friend within the type of British GM David Howell in his farewell sport, a considerably low-stakes affair within the Norwegian Workforce League. Carlsen received each his earlier video games within the weekend in convincing style over 2341-rated FM Levi Andre Tallaksen and 2631-rated GM Jon Ludvig Hammer, his former teammate finally 12 months’s Olympiad. Howell, previously a teammate of Carlsen within the competitors, was in a position to declare a creditable draw towards the world primary in a reasonably quiet sport.
Carlsen obtained an opportunity to play his pet variation within the Ruy Lopez, the Marshall Assault, the place Black sacrifices a pawn to unleash an assault on the enemy king, with typically devastating penalties at decrease ranges of play. The offensive by no means materialized, although, and the sport rapidly changed into an equal place between these two elite gamers. Quickly thereafter, Howell was in a position to steer the sport to an easy endgame regardless of working dangerously low on time, and the gamers rapidly repeated strikes to finish the sport quickly after the time management.
Why has Magnus Carlsen given up his world championship title?
Having been the world champion since 2013, the Norwegian phenom has defended his title on 4 totally different events (towards Viswanathan Anand in 2014, towards Sergey Karjakin in 2016, towards Fabiano Caruana in 2018 and towards Ian Nepomniachtchi in 2021). He was slated to face Nepo once more in a rematch after voicing criticism over the match format.
He confirmed the longstanding suspicions by stating that “it’s greater than 9 years for the reason that Candidates. It’s arduous to say, I don’t suppose I had some other targets than to win it as soon as. Then I assumed I’ll attempt to preserve it so long as I’m motivated, that’s high quality. To be trustworthy, in 2016 I used to be not very motivated. I really feel like I largely performed that match as a result of different individuals form of relied on it, anticipated me to, which was high quality, it was not their fault, it was all on me for feeling that accountability.”
Associated: Magnus Carlsen has given up his crown. What’s next for the chess world?
Although he mentioned he nonetheless loves classical tournaments, he voiced his skepticism over the way in which the world champion is set. With fashionable laptop help, the six-month preparation interval with laptop help towards only one individual leaves little or no room for innovation – or error. It’s no surprise there has not been a decisive sport in his world championship matches for over 5 years, with the match towards Caruana that includes twelve straight attracts earlier than the speedy tiebreakers, the place he simply triumphed over his opponent. His match towards Karjakin additionally required speedy video games to find out a winner, however no less than each gamers drew blood as soon as within the classical portion that point.
This marks the third time within the final fifty years of the sport that the world champion stepped down for one motive or one other, with Bobby Fischer refusing to defend his title towards Anatoly Karpov in 1975 due to his personal issues and criticisms concerning the format, and Garry Kasparov’s resolution in 1993 to separate from the Worldwide Chess Federation (FIDE) in its entirety and to create a separate group. It took till 2006 for the title to be reunited.
Whereas Fischer by no means performed severe aggressive chess once more after his abdication and largely disappeared from public view, Carlsen reveals no indicators of displaying down, and he nonetheless maintains an over 50-point Elo lead over the 2 world championship candidates on the time of writing.
It’s clear he’s not in any respect in combating it out on this explicit format, however will probably be attention-grabbing to see if he alters his thoughts ought to the classical world championship get revamped sooner or later. For now, his time as a world champion is sort of at an finish—no less than on this format—, with the Nepo-Liren match scheduled to begin on April 7.
