Candidates: Javokhir Sindarov continues to surge ahead

Trust Hikaru Nakamura to mess things up. The American not only spoiled his own position but also dented the hopes of other aspirants R Praggnanandhaa and Anish Giri in the Candidates chess tournament on Friday.

The 38-year-old elite GM played for a somewhat speculative advantage against 20year-old World Cup winner Javokhir Sindarov. But Nakamura, who played against players rated Elo 500 or lower than him for an entry in the Candidates, got outplayed by runaway Uzbek leader in Cyprus on Friday.






In the process, Sindarov made his pole position stronger with a fourth win to jump to 4.5 points after five rounds in the eight-player, 14-round tournament.

Nakamura had said on his streaming channel that if he could not beat Sindarov, he would be forced to treat the remaining event as “vacation”. Sadly, his defeat meant that half a point each that Pragg and Giri earned against Andrey Esipenki and Wei Yi respectively, in the same round, became less valuable. The Indian prodigy and the Dutch stalwart are now two full points behind Sindarov, needing four more net wins than the leader in the remaining games to catch up.

Thankfully, all is not lost in terms of the competitive element of the meet as Fabiano Caruna (3.5) defeated Matthias Blubaum and remained only one point behind Sindarov.

“I’m always playing solid. With white, I am playing for two results (win or draw); with black I don’t want to push (stretch things). I’m in a very good situation right now. We’re not yet finished with the first half of the tournament but okay, I’ve won very important games,” Sindarov told the Chess24 webcast.

In the women’s section, Kateryna Lagno of Russia, Anna Muzychuk of Ukraine and Zhu Jiner of China have taken a three-way lead with three points each. Lagno defeated Bibisara Assaubayeva (2.5) and R Vaishali (2) lost to Zhu Jiner with black pieces. Muzychuk drew with Aleksandra Goryachkina (2.5). The Tan Zhongyi vs Divya Deshmukh (both 2 points each) game ended in a draw.
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