A gripping Candidates chess tournament to find a challenger for World Champion Magnus Carlsen of Sweden has been halted just at the halfway stage owing to the coronavirus pandemeic.
And FIDE, subsequently issued the following statement.
Today, the government of the Russian Federation announced that starting March 27, 2020, Russia interrupts air traffic with other countries without indicating any time frames.
FIDE cannot continue the tournament without guarantees for the players’ and officials’ safe and timely return home. In this situation and on the basis of clause 1.5. Rules of Candidates Tournament, the FIDE President decided to stop the tournament. It will be continued later, with the exact dates to be announced as soon, as the global situation related to the COVID-19 pandemic will allow. As it was stipulated by the special rules agreed with the players before the start of the event, the results of the 7 rounds played remain valid, and the tournament will be resumed in the same composition starting with the games of the 8th round. FIDE is grateful to the players, officials, volunteers and the entire team of organizers, including the Chess Federation of Russia and the main partner of the tournament – SIMA-Land.
Sincerely,
Arkady Dvorkovich,
FIDE President
Prior to the stoppage and at the six round mark, Russia’s Ian Nepomniachtchi had occupied sole lead of the tournament leading his nearest challenger by one full point.
However, in round seven, with the black pieces, he ran into his bogeyman, France’s Maxime Vachier-Lagrave.
In 13 previous encounters the Russian had won only once, losing five of the encounters and drawing seven.
His losing streak would continue as he was outplayed despite his choice of ironically, the French Defence.
The two, however, lead the point’s standings with four-and-one half points each after seven rounds.
In another seventh round encounter Fabiano Caruana of the United States of America, the winner of the 2018 Candi-dates, and China’s Wang Hao played to a draw. They each have three-and-one-half points and occupy joint second place along with Russia’s Alexander Grischuck and Anish Giri of The Netherlands who drew their seventh round encounter.
Grischuk has drawn all seven of his encounters in the tournament. In the clash of the bottom-of-the-table players, China’s Ding Niren and Russia’s Kirill Alekseenko played to a draw. They now each have two-and-one-half points and remain in the cellar position.
The pairings for Round Eight which has been postponed are Caruana versus Vachier-Lagrave, Hao versus Liren, Nepomniachtchi versus Giri and Alekseenko versus Grischuk.
This year’s tournament has a prize fund of 500,000 Euros, which is the biggest ever fund for the Candidates tournament.