Another game I watched live at the venue.

It is incredible how the impression of seeing the game without (or sparse) engine input affects the whole experience. As you will see in the comments below, the humans observing often liked one or the other only to learn that it was all “just equal.”

Caruana went for the same line in the Sveshnikov and in spite of his opening success in the previous game it was him who introduced the novelty. I think that Carlsen knew what he was doing and again we saw a very unbalanced position where Carlsen was aiming to attack the king while Caruana was trying to control it and win on the queenside.

The game seemed to be full of ups and downs while computer analysis suggests that the players played on an exceptionally high level with very little deviations from the optimal line. This was an amazing discovery that just confirmed to me how strong these two are. Under such tension and for so high stakes they still manage to produce moves of the highest quality.

I was in fact surprised that Carlsen repeated the Sicilian. I thought that with the match nearing its end he would opt for something safer. But on second thought I realised that this would have been an admission of fear and lack of confidence, which is an awful sign to send to the other side.

And the Sicilian didn’t disappoint. Caruana was also principled and allowed an attack with the hope to be able to control it and win with his passed a-pawn. The way both players managed to both further their own play and limit their opponent’s is worthy of high praise. This meant that neither Carlsen got his attack going as much as he wanted, nor Caruana got to push his a-pawn very far.

This fine fencing on the whole board led to an equal endgame that didn’t look equal. With his central pawn mass it looked better for Black. But Caruana knew better, or he knew just as good as the engine, that entering there he would have no problems.

In fact it was Carlsen who made a careless slip (quite uncharacteristic) and allowed some unpleasantries, but it was all manageable.

Another draw, 5-5, with two games to go. Each has one White left and I am not sure whether we will see a turn towards safety or they will try to use their last chance to win before the overtime. Somehow this is more relevant for Caruana, who will have White in the last game, because the games when he is White are much sharper and more volatile. Will he want to have such a game in Game 12?

Carlsen’s White games were more controlled, so I expect the same sort of sustained attempted pressure in Game 11, as long as he manages to find an idea similar to the last one. If he gets something similar, then it will very uncomfortable for Caruana to suffer like that in his last Black game.

With a free day coming up, both will work hard on their last attempts. It only remains to be seen how serious these attempts will be.