Tbilisi World Cup QF Tiebreaks

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave is through to play a FIDE World Cup semifinal against Levon Aronian after knocking out Peter Svidler in the quarterfinal tiebreaks. Their rapid match was short and bitter for Peter, as he fell behind on the clock and on the board in both games. In the first with Black he managed to fight back and hold a draw, but in the second he was unable to put up much resistance. Maxime now faces Aronian after the first rest day and commented, “He has no reason to be afraid of anyone. I also have no reason to be afraid of anyone, so it should be a good match!”

Peter Svidler, meanwhile, can look back at another World Cup in which he exceeded pre-tournament expectations and played some fine games. It was, in fact, a repeat of his 2013 World Cup, when he also went out in the quarterfinal rapid tiebreaks after two draws in the classical games against Dmitry Andreikin. Although Peter has been a Candidates wildcard in the past it’s unlikely he’ll manage to play in the 2018 tournament in Berlin, but that might at least be good news when it comes to commentary!

Meanwhile in Tbilisi… the players, journalists, photographers, arbiters and, of course, chess fans finally have a rest day after 15 straight days of action. Then it gets really serious fast on Tuesday, when Aronian, MVL, Wesley So and Ding Liren are all just one step away from a place in the Candidates.