I would buy the $15 package so you can watch the actual people live. The threeD and VR are pretty cool. http://www.chessbomb.com is also cool because it has a chat. For example, here is the link to the yet to start game three: https://www.chessbomb.com/arena/201...hampionship/03-Carlsen_Magnus-Karjakin_Sergey Challenging the WC in modern times is done through something called The Candidates. Whoever wins that grueling event wins the right as the challenger to the World Championship. Karjakin won it. The reason Karjakin's rating is not over 2800 is that he is more interested in not losing than in winning. So he draws more games against inferior players than he should, artificially deflating his rating. But he is a player of the highest order, and on a good day can take the WC from Magnus. Magnus is like Federer, Nadal, Djokovich, Borg. They are legends, but legends aren't invincible on any given day.
Game 3 Carlsen-Karjakin 1/2-1/2. Tough, long game. Better than the first two, as Carlsen really pressed on the white side this time. I think Karjakin made it tough for himself with what he played. When I was watching the first half of the game, I thought playing 23...Re8 would be the best way to draw. Even with the bad pawn structure, the active rook should allow enough counterplay. I didn't watch the long endgame. I just played over the moves later without much analysis or a computer, so I don't know if Carlsen missed a win or not somewhere in there. Congrats to Anand for winning the Champions Showdown! The Indian Tiger continues to perform well at the highest levels.
I don't think there is a human being on Earth that could have won that game against Karjakin except Magnus. Even then, he was not able to navigate the infinite labyrinths. Magnus is probably the world's leading expert on over the board minor piece endings. In fact, take a look at how often he steers the game there. Anand will probably continue to do well until he is fifty, and then I expect him to lose top 10. He is a very pleasant person and is probably solely responsible for India's love of chess.
Reaction to Karjakins 19. Bxc4 in game 4. Incomprehensible. Creating a backward pawn on a half open file is something I teach my students about not to do in the first few months of study. The liquid almost went down the wrong pipe! LMAO
In the post-game press conference, Karjakin admitted he totally missed 18...Qc6. He went from thinking 18.Bxh6 was a brilliancy to now thinking his position was just much worse. When 19.Bc1 was pointed out as a better alternative to him, at first he said he was unhappy with that position as well. However, after a little thought he said it could be better, but he was already upset about the entire situation. 19.Bxc4 was just bad. Karjakin was rattled.
Karjakin is Petrosian 2.0. IMO Magnus needs to study how Fischer dismantles Petrosian in the Candidates Final 1971. http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chess.pl?tid=79446
Karjakin is Petrosian 2.0. Hmph. Maybe. You understand this stuff pretty well. History speaks volumes however. Lessons learned are lessons exploited. One word however as it applies to chess. ......Chaos. Expect the unexpected. jmho
Somewhat different, as there are only four games left. Carlsen must have been very frustrated with the match to over-press like that. I wonder what he was thinking when he played 35.c5 - maybe he was taking extra risk based on mutual time trouble or he missed Qa4-d7. He'll press even more now, and he might overplay his position again. A -2 score at this stage is essentially match over. The champion will have to reach deep.