The Results are Tied: Who Will Come Out Ahead As The New World Champion?
The most dramatic WCC match in history.
After a grueling set of thirteen games, the impossible has happened. Grandmasters Ian Nepomniachtchi and Ding Liren both have 6.5 points each and there’s one game left for either player to come out ahead with the necessary 7.5 points needed to win the match. But, it’s a lot harder than that.
Many have attributed the dramatic nature of the World Chess Championship to the fact that Magnus Carlsen, the five time World Champion, decided not to defend his title any longer. When asked in a recent interview if he had any thoughts about who would win, Magnus replied with the infamous line: ‘I literally don’t care.’
“It wasn’t the sweetest moment yesterday, and today I just came and tried to play chess, which obviously was not too brilliant, but yeah, I tried.”
— Ian Nepomniachtchi after his Game 12 loss to Ding Liren
Both players have made astounding brilliant moves as well as horrendous blunders in the span of 13 games. In game 12, Ian was solid until the 25th move. A few hurried and miscalculated moves later and Ian was out of the game.
Chess is a game of nerves and without nerves of steel, it is very easy to fall apart. This was seen clearly during the last WCC match between Magnus Carlsen and one of the current contenders for the title, Ian Nepomniachtchi. The match produced back to back draws up until Game 6 when Ian blundered a bishop and the loss made it difficult for Ian to bounce back against the #1 ranked player in the world.
“Chess is beautiful and equally brutal.”
— Tania Sachdev
And, I could not agree more. In a poll created by Chess.com on YouTube, regardless of tiebreaks which holds 52% of the votes, Ding comes ahead of Ian with a 34% chance of winning compared to a measly 13% for Ian. Ironically, Ding seems to be more timid and lacks nerves at critical points of the game but his genius cannot be denied in those critical points as well.
What will happen in Game 14? Will either player come ahead of the other and clinch the title or will the match go to tie breaks? Tune in to find out!
