It was an epic showdown as Vincent Keymer drew to Magnus Carlsen within the second recreation of their Weissenhaus Freestyle Chess Grand Slam semi-finals, in Wangels (Germany). Keymer had already overwhelmed Carlsen within the first recreation on Tuesday, and on Wednesday showcased his expertise as soon as once more with a gritty draw. The outcome noticed Keymer enter the finals, the place he’ll face Fabiano Caruana.
Hans Niemann’s newest ‘Virat Kohli’ left followers in splits.
Alternatively, Caruana took six video games and nearly eight hours to defeat Uzbek GM Javokhir Sindarov within the armageddon tiebreaker, with even scores within the earlier classical, fast and blitz video games.
Taking to X, previously referred to as Twitter, American GM Hans Niemann posted a cryptic tweet. Initially, he wrote, “VK is a strong player”, which many followers perceived to be Keymer, and in addition an oblique dig at Carlsen. Carlsen and Niemann have been concerned in an notorious chess dishonest scandal in 2022.
However quickly, Niemann struck once more, in reference to his earlier ‘VK’ tweet. He joked that by ‘VK’, he meant Vladimir Kramnik, and never Indian cricketer Virat Kohli and even Keymer. He quipped,, “VK is Vladimir Kramnik, not Virat Kohli or Vincent Keymer :)”
Followers have been left in splits, with one responding, “The crossover no one expected.”
Listed here are the opposite reactions:
Keymer was one in all Gukesh’s seconds on the current World Championship, the place the Indian GM defeated Ding Liren to create historical past. Talking to the Take Take Take software after knocking out Carlsen, Keymer mentioned, “Mostly I’m relieved that I managed to see out this very tough game. And also it’s for me a personal incredible achievement to beat Magnus in a match.”
“I mean, basically, even if I was in a must-win situation, that position would have been quite nice. I mean, my position was, I think, clearly better. I was up on the clock around 20 minutes. So, yeah, to get myself into that much trouble after that is really not something I’m proud of. But, yeah, it happened,” he added.
On Wednesday, D Gukesh’s depressing run at Weissenhaus continued as he crashed to a defeat to veteran GM Hikaru Nakamura. Nakamura will contest for fifth place with Nodirbek Abdusattorov, who beat Alireza Firouzja.