D Gukesh and Magnus Carlsen at Norway Chess (Images via X/@NorwayChess)
D Gukesh failed to see the knight fork. And when it was on the board, the pain was difficult to hide. The 19-year-old record-breaking world champion did not cry. He did not bang the table either.
But he was inconsolable, sitting stunned in his chair, covering his face and forehead. He remained in the chair, not making eye contact with anyone and turning the chair the other way, making his face less visible. Fabiano Caruana had given a lifeline to Gukesh in the 10th and last round by missing some tactics in a thrilling endgame in Stavanger on Friday. The winning position for the American turned dead equal when Caruana made a dubious pawn push on the 47th turn in the queen, knight, bishop and pawns vs queen, rook and pawns endgame.
He failed to see a forced sequence that would have given him extra bishop in queen and pawns each climax.But Gukesh made a cardinal mistake of queening his d-file pawn in a hurry. The knight fork (for rook and queen) which gave him quite a heartburn. Moments earlier, Magnus Carlsen had just managed to draw with Arjun E,rigaisi and jumped to a minimum 16 points in a topsy-turvy game, meaning a classical 3-0 win for Caruana would be still short of Carlsen by at least half a point.
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But if Gukesh had held his position to a draw in time trouble, he could have caught Carlsen level on points with a win in the Armageddon (worth 1.5 points) and Carlsen losing the Armageddon (worth one point). That would have set up a blitz tiebreak between Carlsen and Gukesh for the title. But Gukesh let this opportunity slip away. For a change, lady luck smiled the other way. Minutes later, Carlsen indeed lost his Armageddon game against Arjun with black pieces.
But it was still good enough to be clear first and clinch the Norway title for the seventh time.
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Earlier, Anna Muzychuk failed to beat R Vaishali with white pieces in a winning position in the Armageddon game. The draw with white pieces (hence technical defeat in 10 mins vs 7 mins scenario) meant she finished on 16.5 points and had to wait for Humpy’s result. Since the Indian veteran could only draw with women’s world champion Ju Wenjun after a temporary knight sacrifice in the classical game, Ukraine’s world No.
7, Muzychuk (Elo 2535), took an unassailable lead. It was the first Norway title for the Olympiad winne
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