The derby of the round between Caruana and Carlsen saw a theoretical battle in the Berlin endgame. Carlsen decided not to repeat the Sicilian that brought him a good win in Wijk aan Zee against the same opponent and chose to play it safely. He varied from the game he lost to Caruana in Shamkir last year and introduced a good novelty.

Aronian and Adams played a line in the English that was considered refuted by the famous game Kasparov-Ivanchuk, USSR 1988. When Kasparov introduced the English Opening as his main white opening in the match against Karpov in Seville he came up with many interesting ideas in it. Although he lost to Karpov in the very first game he played it (game 2 of the match) he won in the same line in game 4 and then destroyed Ivanchuk a year later. But theory never stands still and the modern computers and engines found satisfactory ways for black even in lines that Kasparov refuted. Black was even better in the game, but Aronian managed to save the draw.

Bacrot and Naiditsch played a quiet line in the Queen’s Indian (which started as a Bogo-Indian) and black didn’t have problems. He may have tried for more, but Naiditsch probably just wants to draw his games and hope that he shares first with Carlsen (when there will be a rapid/blitz playoff).

Anand routinely outplayed Baramidze. The game lasted 65 moves, but the result was never in any doubt from around move 20. I remember reading an advice by Nick Bollettieri (the famous tennis coach) that went something like this: when you get into a rut, or you lose a few matches in a row, go find somebody who’s no match for you, and destroy him. The idea as I understand it is to bring your confidence back, as nothing serves better for that than a win. Today Anand did just that.

Will Bacrot manage to draw all his games in Baden-Baden? We’ll find out tomorrow, when he’s black against Carlsen. Naiditsch is white against Aronian and that game will depend on Aronian’s desire to play for a win.

Carlsen beat Baramidze in the same way a 2500 player beats a 2250 player – in one moment the weaker player cracks. Black played two bad moves in a row and it was over:

Adams and Bacrot drew, but only after Bacrot missed several wins. It’s not an easy task to outplay Adams with black, but Bacrot played a fine game and after the game it must have been shocking for him to see the comp evaluation before his 55th move.

I thought Caruana would try to beat Naiditsch, but it seems to me he either got tricked in the opening – he didn’t expect Naiditsch to allow the Marshall, or he messed up something over the board, because Naiditsch was actually following the games Caruana-Aronian and Adams-Aronian, both from last year! I’d side with the latter, because the move Caruana played (20…Re1) indicated that he was trying to follow Aronian, only he failed to remember the exact move-order. And if you don’t know it exactly, it is a bit complex to figure out over the board: when to take on e1, when to exchange the queens and when to play Kf8. What do to, a common occurence in modern chess, especially when you haven’t refreshed your memory before the game.

Aronian is a very difficult opponent for Anand, perhaps even more so than Carlsen. If I’m not mistaken the results is +8-3 in Aronian’s favour and today he won again. It’s curious that he chose the same line in the Ragozin that Carlsen used to beat him in Wijk aan Zee last month! But Anand was well prepared and got good play with active play on the kingside. What was surprising is that Anand missed a very good tactical opportunity on move 23 and collapsed very quickly after that. Did yesterday’s loss have such a devastating effect on him?

So Carlsen finally leads the tournament, together with the local hero Naiditsch and tomorrow we have Caruana-Carlsen and Bacrot-Naiditsch. Will Carlsen try to beat Caruana with black like he did in Wijk? Will he repeat the Sicilian?

Tournament play has its own rules, but the Stonewall?!? I cannot know about Capablanca and Anand, but I sense that this choice must have been felt as a sort of an insult. An open provocation if you like. And it’s hard to keep calm and play normal chess when provoked like this. Both Alekhine and Carlsen obtained good positions after the opening, but back in 1936 Alekhine wasn’t a World Champion – his nerves in the period 1935 (when he lost to Euwe) – 1937 (when he regained the title) weren’t very stable (as he wrote himself) and Capablanca’s proved to be better on the day – he got a sweet revenge for the title loss in 1927. Carlsen is a World Champion today and if anything he has a psychological advantage over Anand, so he could rely on his nerves more than Alekhine could. And indeed, some of Anand’s choices looked as if he tried to “punish” Carlsen, but when you try to punish instead of just play you lose objectivity and it’s easy to drift away. I think Anand overestimated his plan of play in the centre (Be1, de5, Rd1, f3, Bh3, e4) and underestimated black’s defensive and counterattacking resources. In a twist of fate, he lost because of a far-advanced passed a-pawn, just like in the 9th game of the match in Chennai.

The German players in the event played a strange game. The usually quiet English Opening led to some wild tactics early on. I played Baramidze in the European Team Championship in 2007 – I managed to catch him in a deep prep and I was winning for a long time, but he fought tirelessly and managed to save the draw. I didn’t get the impression he was a tactical player, but today he really went all out against Naiditsch. I think Aronian’s comment on white’s 23rd move sums the game pretty well. This win kept Naiditsch in the lead and on course of an even more impressive tournament victory than his famous Dortmund win in 2005 (ahead of Topalov, Bacrot, Kramnik Adams, Svidler, Leko, van Wely, Sutovsky and Nielsen).

The other two games were drawn. Caruana obtained an advantage against Adams, who seemed to surprise him with his choice of the Slav, but allowed too much counterplay which he couldn’t contain.

Bacrot and Aronian played a line in the Ragozin which I faced against GM Bartel in the Individual European Chess Championship in 2008. I didn’t react very well and lost rather easily, so I was surprised to see Aronian provoke the c5 advance, something I wanted to avoid.

Tomorrow’s game between Naiditsch and Caruana may well be decisive for the tournament victory – unless, of course, Carlsen wins all his remaining games.

And here we are 90 years later after Alekhine’s triumph in Baden-Baden, with yet another super-tournament. They say the world is in economic crisis, but from what I can see crisis is a time when the rich are getting richer and the poor and the middle-class are getting poorer. Speaking of chess, the rich (the elite) are getting richer, with the neverending string of super-tournaments, where they get good prizes and appearance fees, while the rest are faced with the gloom of the disappearing opens, diminishing prizes and dour conditions. Chess politicians (just remember the latest FIDE elections) only speak of the Carlsens and Anands and Kramniks and the kids – hence the super-tournaments (the latest rumour is of a “Golden League”) and the increasingly popular chess-in-schools talks while all in between doesn’t seem to matter. The obvious tendency is that the only chess professionals will be the Top 10 or 20, while the rest will either work for them (seconds, helpers, analysts etc.) or will teach children how to move the knight. Which reminds me of something I read about the world tendencies, that in the future one will either be a barrister or a barista, with pretty much nothing in between.

Going back to the actual moves, the first two rounds saw 7 draws and the expected Carlsen win against Adams. Adams was one of Carlsen’s seconds in the last match against Anand, but that didn’t help him much – he lost in a typical way he loses against Carlsen – he was slowly strangled. It’s interesting to observe when two players with similar styles play, then the one with the lower class doesn’t have the slightest of chances to survive, simply because they play similarly and he has no surprises, while playing in the usual way is hopeless as the other one is better at it. Just as an illustration – Carlsen and Adams have played 8 games (including the one today) when Carlsen was white and the result is telling – only one draw for Adams.

14 Rf4, a new move by Carlsen

It’s difficult to imagine Adams losing this to anyone else, but we already know that Carlsen has super-powers.

Worth noting was Anand’s good novelty in the Semi-Tarrasch against Naiditsch.

13 d5!? instead of 13 Qa5 as played in Gelfand-Wang Yue,2014

The other games were more or less normal. I’m curious to see whether Caruana will show a glimpse of his Sinquefield superiority, but his two draws with white are not very promising signs.