Wesley So fails to defend Tata Steel Crown

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Wesley So fails to defend Tata Steel Crown
But the bigger battle for the Philippine-born So, who now plays under the US flag, is the Candidates Tournament where at stake will be the right to challenge world chess champion Magnus Carlsen

MANILA, Philippines – Wesley So, the Philippine born chess player who now competes  for the United States, surrendered his crown at the Tata Steel tournament at the Netherlands on Sunday, January 28.

So won this most prestigious event in world chess last year ahead of world champion Magnus Carlsen of Norway.

This year Carlsen ended So’s hopes of retaining the Tata crown, by beating him in the 10th round in a rook and bishop endgame.

The 23-year-old Cavite-born So’s final score was 8 points, the same as former world champion Viswanathan Anand, but the latter took 5th place on tiebreak.

The 27-year-old Norwegian world champion ended up the winner of the 80th edition of this prestigious tournament by beating Dutch grandmaster Anish Giri in the tiebreak matches. 

A report on the Xinhuanet.com  said both Carlsen and Giri were deadlocked at 9 points each after the 13th and final round. In the playoffs, Carlsen won the first blitz game of 5 minutes and drew the second to claim his record 6th win.

Carlsen had also won the 2008, 2010, 2013, 2015, and 2016 editions.

So snapped Carlsen’s string of wins by ruling the 2017 tournament.

Though So lost the Tata Steel crown this year, the most important event of his young professional life will take place 6 weeks from now. This is the Candidates Tournament, where the winner will challenge Carlsen for the world championship.

Aside from So, those who played in the Tata Steel tournament were Fabiano Caruana, Shakriyar Mamedyarov, Sergei Karjakin and, former world champion Vladimir Kramnik.

The other finalists were China’s Ding Liren who trounced So in the semifinal of the World Cup and Alexander Grischuk.

In Tata Steel, So saved two losing games, earning 1.5 points. He salvaged a draw against Caruana and recovered from a bad position from Wei Yi.

The world champion Carlsen showed in a video after the game that So missed a chance to defend an advantage Carlsen threw away in the endgame.

So’s other wins came in the last round against former women’s world champion Hou Yifan and British champion Gawain Jones.

In Tata Steel, So appeared to be conserving energy and not forcing matters especially when he fell out of the share of the early lead. It was a wise move as the real battle in his young chess career is ahead of him,

So qualified for the Candidates by having the highest rating average from January to November. He was number two in the world in March before he went on a slump in the 3rd quarter. But So recovered at the World Cup where he challenged for a spot in the finals until he lost a war of nerves against Ding Liren, who is the 3rd Asian after Eugene Torre and Viswanathan Anand to enter a Candidates stage.

Now ranked 6th in the world, So will be returning to the US.

So had to let go of his coach, Vladimir Tukmakov late last year, sources said.

No one knows how his program for the Candidates will proceed. This is the most important period of his career, where his followers, many of them Filipinos who always consider him as a compatriot, will be waiting for eagerly. – Rappler.com

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