Round 11 of the 2022 Candidates: Nepomniachtchi vs. Ding for the World Championship?

“It’s difficult to make predictions, especially about the future.” - Anonymous

We commentators are remarkably insightful when it comes to explaining what has just happened, though this awesome gift of hindsight rarely translates into successful predictions the next time around. It turns out that commentators should not only avoid predictions before an event; they should also be careful about offering their explanations during an event. To wit:

After seven rounds of the Candidates, it was “obvious” that Fabiano Caruana was in great form, while Ding Liren was in bad shape. In Ding’s case, he was rusty when it came to top-level opposition, while he was probably burned out from all the games he played against relatively weak opposition in March as he scrambled to qualify for the tournament. That mad dash would also have taken away from time he would have spent in opening preparation. And for Caruana, just look at the games: great opening preparation, impressive victories, good fighting spirit - the whole package.

And now? Caruana has scored just half a point from his last four games, falling 2.5 points behind the leader and into fourth place, while Ding has only given up half a point from his last four games, winning three in a row and finding himself in clear second. Clearly, the narrative in the preceding paragraph was all wrong. Maybe Caruana’s form wasn’t entirely up to snuff - he failed to convert against Ian Nepomniachtchi in round 2, despite outpreparing and outplaying him, and once things got tough he fell apart. As for Ding, the truth, obviously, was that he needed a little time to get acclimated, and now that he has he’ll finish in second place - at worst.

This is the full and sober truth, the entire explanation, and the final word on what has happened and why—at least until something happens in the next three rounds to upend these tidy explanations. But fear not: once that happens, the commentariat will confabulate a new “full and sober truth”, and if we wait until the tournament is over the new story will undoubtedly stand the test of time…

I don’t know what exactly has gone wrong for Caruana over the past four rounds, or even if there is some overarching explanation that transcends what went wrong in each of the four games. Likewise, it’s hard to know why exactly Ding has won his last three games, after going winless through the first eight rounds. Ding came close to winning in rounds 3 and 5, and had a nice advantage in game 2; what was different about those rounds compared to rounds 9-11? I don’t know.

It is possible to explain the details of the games themselves, though, and you’ll want to have a look at today’s game between Caruana and Ding. They came into the round tied for second with Hikaru Nakamura, a point and a half behind Nepomniachtchi. Caruana had the white pieces and played very well up to the time control. He hadn’t made the most of his chances, but still enjoyed a clear advantage and good winning chances. But somehow, things started to go wrong, a bit at a time, and by the third time control Caruana was fighting for his life. He didn’t manage it, making his final error on move 75 and resigning after three more moves.

As Nakamura didn’t manage to defeat Richard Rapport (despite trying until move 96!), Ding is now in clear second. He remains a point and a half behind Nepomniachtchi, who is almost certainly uncatchable at this point, with just three rounds left. Nepo won a nice game against Alireza Firouzja, who went a bit bonkers trying to blow Nepo off the board. It’s hard to say for sure, but Firouzja’s over-caffeinated approach may have been partially due to his having played 357 hyperbullet (30-second) games on Lichess the previous evening/night/early morning.

Finally, Teimour Radjabov and Jan-Krzysztof Duda played a game that suggested that they’d like to get the event over with and move on to the next one.

The games, with my notes, are here.

A reminder: If Carlsen carries out his threat not to defend his title, the top two finishers here will play for the crown. Should that come to pass, Nepo is practically guaranteed to qualify, as he is two full points ahead of Nakamura, who is alone in third place. Guess what tomorrow’s marquee matchup is?

Round 12 Pairings:

Rapport (4.5) - Caruana (5.5)

Ding (6.5) - Radjabov (5)

Duda (4.5) - Firouzja (4)

Nepomniachtchi (8) - Nakamura (6)