Norway chess: Players gearing up for exciting finish

Stavanger, June 4

The seventh round of the Norway Chess tournament in the wee hours today witnessed gripping matches with tense moments that significantly impacted the standings.

With top players in high stakes games, the outcomes of this round have set the stage for an exciting conclusion to the tournament. Both the men’s and women’s sections saw intense battles, strategic plays and key victories that reshaped the leaderboard.

One of the highlights of the day was the match between Koneru Humpy and R Vaishali as Koneru Humpy scored the only classical victory of the day in both tournaments. With this loss, the former tournament leader Vaishali’s winning chances have significantly decreased.

World champion Ding Liren, who has been underperforming with four losses in a row, finally stopped the bleeding with a much-needed draw against R Praggnanandhaa.

However, he missed a trick and lost the Armageddon tie-breaker, with Praggnanandhaa remaining on the third spot of the standings (11 points).

In the highly anticipated game between Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura, the classical game ended in a draw relatively quickly, as both sides avoided complicated positions.

The Armageddon tiebreak was one of the most intense games so far in the tournament, as Nakamura won when Carlsen’s time ran out on the clock. This win brought Nakamura within half-a-point of Carlsen, who is leading the tournament with 13 points.

Fabiano Caruana sacrificing his knight against Alireza Firouzja almost backfired in a classical draw before the latter gave no chances in

the decider.