Magnus Carlsen (35) has the knife at his throat against Levon Aronian ahead of the second final match in the Grand Slam Freestyle Chess tournament in South Africa. The first ended in defeat.
Carlsen got off to a slow start with black pieces in the first final game and must win with white pieces in the next to force a playoff game with blitz chess.
Aronian wins the final in Cape Town in South Africa with a draw in the next game.
Carlsen spent a lot of time early in the first game, and Aronian quickly gained a fairly clear lead. The Norwegian world number one still held out for a long time, and it wasn’t all over until after 45 moves.
– This is not what we are used to with Magnus. It doesn’t quite seem like the chess head is in place yet, said TV 2’s chess presenter Fin Gnatt on the channel’s broadcast.
Expert commentator Jon Ludvig Hammer pointed out that Carlsen made an unnecessary mistake.
– He has made a single mistake in the entire party, and that has punished him very severely, said Hammer.
Carlsen struggled against the wind throughout most of the match.
– There is nothing positive to say about Carlsen’s position, Hammer said after the 13th move.
Then the computers showed over a 90 percent chance of victory for Aronian, and in addition, Carlsen only had a minute left on the clock, while Aronian had a full 18 minutes.
Levon Aronian won the previous Grand Slam tournament in Freestyle Chess in Las Vegas, while Carlsen won two of the first three Grand Slam tournaments in the branch earlier this year and, regardless of the result in the final, takes a clear overall victory in this year’s series.
Carlsen made it to the final after a playoff match in lightning chess against the Uzbek Javokhir Sindarov in Wednesday’s semi-final.
