norway chess: Pragg falls to Carlsen, Vaishali going strong

Stavanger, June 5

Indian Grandmaster R Praggnanandhaa went down fighting against top seed Magnus Carlsen of Norway while his elder sister R Vaishali defeated overnight sole leader Anna Muzychuk of Ukraine in the eighth round of Norway Chess here.

With the win, Carlsen stretched his lead to a full point over the United States’ Hikaru Nakamura, who lost to Firouzja Alireza of France.

Meanwhile, world champion Ding Liren’s dismal run continued as he lost to Fabiano Caruana of the United States. With just two rounds to go in the six-player double round-robin tournament, Carlsen has 14.5 points, while Nakamura has 13.5. Praggnanandhaa is in third spot on 12, a full point clear of Alireza. Caruana occupies the fifth spot with 9 points, while China’s Liren seems to have resigned to his fate in this event, being a distant last on 4.5 points.

In the women’s section, world champion Wenjun Ju of China scored a win over Pia Cramling of Sweden to surge ahead of the field on 14.5 points, also benefitting from Muzychuk’s loss against Vaishali. The Ukrainian remained in the second spot on 13 points, 1.5 points ahead of Vaishali and China’s Tingjie Lei, who accounted for Koneru Humpy. Humpy on eight points remained fifth in the standings, 3.5 points more than Cramling.

All the three games in the men’s category ended in draws in the Classical leading to the Armageddon.

Carlsen could not really dent Praggnanandhaa’s solid play in the Classical. With a laboured effort, the world No. 1 won a pawn but only ended up reaching a theoretically drawn rooks and pawns endgame. However, in the following game, Praggnanandhaa could not match the guile of Carlsen and lost a handful of pawns while reaching the endgame wherein the Indian had two minor pieces against a rook. Eventually, white’s extra material had the final say.