Wesley So advances with Carlsen, Nakamura in Skilling Open playoffs

Wesley So cruised into the knockout phase along with favorites Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura on Wednesday, November 25, Philippine time in the Skilling Open.

Under no pressure to go all-out for wins, So drew his last 5 games and wound up third behind world champion Carlsen and speed chess exponent Nakamura after the preliminary stage of the 16-player online event kicking off the $1.5 million (P72.3 million) Champions Chess Tour.

The top-seeded Carlsen trounced Vidit Gujrathi in round 13 and drew with Nakamura, So, Le Quang Liem and Peter Svidler to finish tied with Nakamura at 9 points after the single round-robin eliminations.

So, the Philippines’ No. 1 before switching to the United States federation, wound up with 8.5 points in the company of Russian ace Ian Nepomniachtchi and Armenian star Levon Aronian.

Completing the quarterfinals cast with 8 points each are Teimour Radjabov of Azerbaijan, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave of France, and two-day pacesetter Anish Giri of the Netherlands.

Iranian teen sensation Alireza Firouzja and Vietnamese icon Le Quang Liem also tallied 8 points but got booted out after the tiebreaks.

It was a heartbreaker for Firouzja who seized the lead after round 13 with 3 straight victories over Ding, Giri and Sergey Karjakin.

Firouzja got stalled by Nakamura in round 14 then fell off the tracks with another loss to Le, the 2013 world blitz champion.

Carlsen tangles with Giri, Nakamura tackles Vachier-Lagrave, So battles Radjabov, and Nepomniachtchi takes on Aronian in the two-match quarterfinals on Thursday and Friday. 

Each match will consist of 4 games and if the score is tied at 1-1 there will be a two-game blitz playoffs.

Picked to win are Carlsen, Nakamura, So, the reigning US champion, and Nepomniachtchi.

The semifinals are set Saturday and Sunday with the finalists disputing the top purse of $30,000 in another two-day match. – Rappler.com