Armageddon king Caruana sets up Abdusattorov final
Fabiano Caruana won Armageddon games against both Jules Moussard and Jorden van Foreest to win the Losers bracket of the ChessKid Cup and set up a rematch against Nodirbek Abdusattorov. On Friday they’ll play for the $30,000 top prize and a spot in the end-of-year Champions Chess Tour Playoffs.
Nodirbek Abdusattorov was able to take a rest on Thursday after clinching the Winners Bracket while three players fought it out to decide who would face him in the Grand Final. First up was Fabiano Caruana against Jules Moussard, with the winner getting to play Jorden van Foreest.
It started out with a positional masterclass by Fabiano, who pounced on the slow 18…Kf8!?
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19.a4! Nc7 20.axb5 cxb5 21.Ra5 a6 saw Jules Moussard holding on but forced into passivity. Caruana doubled rooks on the a-file, then switched to attacking on the kingside and went on to score an effortless win.
This wasn’t the kind of thing the young Jules had got into chess for.
All Fabiano needed in the second game was a draw, but it wouldn’t prove so easy. He later lamented:
I’m reasonably happy with how I played, even though I think against Jules the second game was unnecessary. I had a huge advantage and basically no risk, and then I blundered b3 and suddenly I had to fight in a very complex endgame, which is not really what I was aiming for.
This was that moment after Fabiano went for 31…g5!?
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32.fxg5 Ne5! is what Black was hoping for, while 32.b3! forced 32…Nxf4 33.Rxf4! gxf4 34.bxc4 bxc4, and although Fabiano was still better we got an interesting position where ultimately Moussard’s knights were the heroes. He ended by scoring a crushing win, his fourth win in four games with the white pieces in the Losers bracket.
Jules got White for the Armageddon, meaning he needed a fifth win to progress, but this time Fabiano made absolutely no mistake and was winning in the final position where he agreed a draw to clinch the match.
Fabiano had little time to rest before he went on to face Jorden van Foreest.
In the first game the young Dutchman played a strong novelty on move 14, but Fabiano was on top with the black pieces when 23.Re3 appeared on the board. After two minutes, he went for 23…Nh4!?
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The immediate trick is that 24.Nxh4?? loses to back-rank mate with 24…Qb1+ 25.Re1 Qxe1#, but both players had seen further. We ultimately got 24.Nf6+! (the white queen now defends the b1-square) 24...gxf6 25.Nxh4 Qxd4 26.h3!
Fabiano explained how he’d half been tricked by his opponent and half-tricked himself.
When he played 23.Re3 I understood he was trying to trick me, but then I thought I’d try to trick him in his trick by playing 23…Nh4, because I saw this 24.Nf6+, which was obviously his trick, and I don’t know if he finally tricked me, or if he hadn’t seen this 26.h3 in advance. I’d seen h3, but I didn’t see that he could trap my queen with Rg4. I thought if I just take the knight, I put my king on h8, and of course otherwise I would never go for this, because I was slightly better if I hadn’t gone for Nh4.
What Fabiano had missed at first was that after 26…Qxh4 Jorden could play 27.Rg3+! Kh8 28.Rg4, and Fabiano had to give up his queen with 28…Qxg4 29.hxg4 Kg7.
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The good news for Fabi, however, is that he had a wide margin for error. He explained:
I still wasn’t worried, because I figured when I went down this line that even if I blunder something, most likely I will be able to sac my queen in some way and make a draw, and this is not a particularly complex fortress. I wasn’t too worried, because very often there’s fortresses when you just have a rook against queen, but rook and bishop is almost always a fortress.
So it proved as Fabiano went on to hold a draw. The second game was then the quietest of the day, which meant Armageddon, with Fabiano this time getting White, since he’d lost the bidding war by a mere three seconds!
Fabiano was up to the task of winning with White as well, however, and did it with consummate ease. He got a good knight against a bad bishop, and when Jorden went for a central pawn break it only grew White’s advantage. It was all over in 48 moves.
48…Bxd6 49.a7 and the a-pawn queens, while 48…Kb8 49.a7+! and White takes the bishop on c7.
That means that after losing to Nodirbek Abdusattorov in the Winners Semifinals Fabiano has now won three matches (“it’s been a tough road to get here!”) to set up a rematch against Abdusattorov.
Fabiano commented on the fact that Nodirbek still has the lifeline of being able to lose the first 4-game final, since he'd then get a second chance with a 2-game "reset".
Considering he has two lives I guess I am an underdog in this match, but if I get past the first one, I do feel like there’s some psychological edge going into the second one… He’s been showing super-consistent chess, it’s going to be really, really tough, and I would be lying if I said I don’t feel like a bit of an underdog to win two matches against him, but I’ll try my best, and I’m very happy to be here in the final.
We’ll also get the final of Division II, where Vladimir Fedoseev and Shakhriyar Mamedyarov will be vying to join Caruana, Abdusattorov and Jorden van Foreest with a guaranteed spot in the next Champions Chess Tour event, and Division III, where Alan Pichot and Harikrishna will battle it out for a $5,000 prize.
Don't miss all the action from 16:00 CEST (11am ET, 8:30pm IST): Div 1 Winners, Div 2 Winners, Div 3 Winners
See also
Caruana “miracle” as he knocks out Firouzja
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