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Suleymanli Wins Longest World Cup Round 1 Match

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Suleymanli Wins Longest World Cup Round 1 Match

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Top seeds GMs Magnus Carlsen, Hikaru Nakamura, and Ju Wenjun commence battle in the 2023 FIDE World Cup in Wednesday’s round two, but first, there were 33 places to be decided in tiebreaks. It took six hours, with 18-year-old local star GM Aydin Suleymanli only defeating GM Xu Yinglun after their first nine games were drawn. 

Round two begins on Wednesday, August 2, at 7 a.m. ET / 13:00 CEST / 4:30 p.m IST.

   How to watch the 2023 FIDE World Cup

No less than 33 round-one matches went to tiebreaks, 24 in the Open section and nine in the Women’s, with the system a familiar one.

First, there would be two games where with a 25+10 time control. If still tied, they would play two 10+10 games, then two 5+3 games, but finally, instead of the single “armageddon” game of previous years, there was a twist—we would get single 3+2 games until we got a winner. As it turned out, that innovation would be tested immediately.

The early rounds of the World Cup feature huge tiebreak sessions. Photo: Stev Bonhage/FIDE.

Let’s take a look at the day’s matches based on when they ended.

Two 25-Minute Games: 24 Players Eliminated

Most of the favorites managed to wrap up qualification for round two fast, with the likes of GMs Eduardo Iturrizaga, Ferenc Berkes, and Velimir Ivic continuing their recovery from shock day-one losses to ease through.

That meant the end of the road for the youngest player in the event, 14-year-old Ediz Gurel, who lost the last three games to Ivic after his fantastic win in the first. Ivic is now through to face GM Francisco Vallejo Pons, the same player he beat in round two in 2021.

GM Eltaj Safarli shrugged off his forfeit loss after not making it to the venue on time the day before to score 2-0 against IM Roberto Carlos Sanchez Alvarez.

Another 2-0 was scored by Indian “beast” GM Baskaran Adhiban, who defeated GM Lance Henderson de La Fuente. That sets up a mouth-watering round-two pairing of Adhiban against another of the world’s most creative players, GM Daniil Dubov. 

We got the answer to the question of who top-seed Carlsen will play in round two, as 37-year-old Georgian GM Levan Pantsulaia edged an entertaining rollercoaster ride against Indian GM Harsha Bharathakoti. The key game ended in a sudden, and beautiful, checkmate.

The one real upset saw the 158th seed, Azerbaijani GM Abdulla Gadimbayli, defeat 99th seed and fellow 21-year-old GM Shamsiddin Vokhidov from Uzbekistan.

Polish GM Mateusz Bartel is another player through to round two. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

The Women’s section followed the same pattern, with all but one of the match-ups ending in the 25-minute games. Once again, the favorites hit back, with IM Salome Melia, who needed over 100 moves to win on demand the day before, catching Brazilian WIM Kathie Goulart Librelato out in the opening. The stylish 10.b6!?, instead of recapturing on f3, led to a brilliant miniature win.

One upset in the Women’s matches, at least on paper, was 74th seed WFM Michalina Rudzinska storming back from losing the first game to 55th seed WGM Thi Kim Phung Vo to win the next three. Rudzinska has now won the Polish Women’s Championship two years in a row, however, despite being one of the rating underdogs—so there is not much that she accomplishes that should surprise us. 

Rudzinska won three games in a row to reach round two. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

Two 10-Minute Games: Five Players Eliminated

Round one for the women was completed in the 10-minute games, as French IM Pauline Guichard ended the tough resistance of WIM Assel Serikbay from Kazakhstan. 

The Open field was also cut in half, with four matches ending. The most notable was an upset win for 23-year-old Argentinian IM Pablo Ismael Acosta, who won a topsy-turvy match against two-time Polish Chess Champion GM Kacper Piorun. Acosta got to deliver checkmate on the board in the first tiebreak game, then Piorun hit back before Acosta finally ground out an endgame win in the second 10-minute game. 

Acosta, who now faces GM Bogdan-Daniel Deac, admitted that he hadn’t expected to win.

Piorun also described how it felt!

Two 5-Minute Games: Three Players Eliminated

The three matches that ended in five-minute blitz were all thrillers and featured three of the oldest players remaining in the tournament. The one to go through was the youngest of the three, 55-year-old GM Ilia Smirin, who twice had to win on demand against young Colombian GM Santiago Avila Pavas, before winning both of the final blitz games.

30.Rg6! (not capturing anything) was the kind of move it’s worth going through hell to get the chance to play.

Avila resigned, since capturing the rook leads to immediate checkmate, and the only way to briefly prolong the game would be to give up the black rook for the g7-bishop.

The second youngest, 56-year-old GM Carlos Matamoros Franco from Ecuador, came from behind, took the lead, but eventually fell to the favorite GM Ante Brkic from Croatia. That wild match saw both players miss huge chances to turn things in their favor. 

The oldest player remaining in the tournament put up a huge fight. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

Another Croatian GM, 57-year-old Zdenko Kozul, gave 25-year-old GM Vahap Sanal from Turkey a run for his money, winning on demand twice in a match that didn’t feature a single draw.

In the end, however, Sanal’s victory in the following wild game was one from which Zdenko was unable to come back. GM Rafael Leitao has annotated it for us below. 

Sanal will now face 2021 World Rapid Champion GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov in round two

Sudden-death 3-Minute Games: One player Eliminated

That leaves us with a totally different match that was the only one to reach the ninth game, after eight draws. The players would now play single three-minute games for as long as it took for a player to score a win. The first such game was drawn, but the tenth game finally saw the damn burst, with a win for 18-year-old local hero Suleymanli against Xu. 

Suleymanli is one of the great hopes of Azerbaijani chess. Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.

The game was everything we could hope for and had been denied earlier in the match. Suleymanli built up a winning position, then let it slip, then finally benefited from a rush of blood to the head of his opponent. 38…Ng4? was just too clever!

Suleymanli was immediately congratulated by FIDE Vice President and President of the Azerbaijan Chess Federation Mahir Mammedov.

So 33 more players are out of the FIDE World Cup, but 75 of the world’s best players now join for round two, with 64 matches in the Open section and 32 in the Women’s. 

The players include world number-one Carlsen, who has been doing Carlsen things.

The man Carlsen is seeded to play in the final, Nakamura, arrived in Baku only to find no running water in the hotel taps, though his day soon improved.

Nakamura seems to be in Baku with WGM Atousa Pourkashiyan, after their recent marriage. 

GM Peter Leko and IM Tania Sachdev will be commentating on all the round-two action. 

The 2023 FIDE World Cup and Women’s World Cup in Baku, Azerbaijan, are big knockout events that will determine six spots in the 2024 FIDE Candidates Tournaments. The action begins July 30 and ends August 24, with a combined $2.5 million prize fund.

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