Caruana clinches Tata Steel Masters; Anand finishes joint sixth

Fabiano Caruana equalled the record-winning score of 10 points from 13 round Magnus Carlsen and Garry Kasparov to win the Tata Steel Masters chess tournament.

Published : Jan 27, 2020 21:01 IST

USA's Fabiano Caruana, assured of the title before the final round, signed off with a win over Russia’s Vladislav Artemiev in the 13th round.

Five-time champion Viswanathan Anand finished tied sixth after drawing his 13th-round encounter with Poland’s Jan-Krzysztof Duda in 23 moves in the Tata Steel Masters chess tournament here on Sunday.

Anand aggregated 6.5 points from 13 rounds and shared the sixth spot with three others.

Fabiano Caruana, assured of the title before the final round, signed off with a win over Russia’s Vladislav Artemiev and matched the record-winning score of 10 points from 13 rounds.

Since 1980, when the event became a 13-round competition, only Garry Kasparov (1999) and Magnus Carlsen (2013) have won by scoring 10 points.

Two other previous champions, who won by a two-point margin over nine rounds, were Max Euwe (1952) and Fredrik Olafsson (1959).

Since the inception of the event in 1939, Viktor Korchnoi’s three-point winning margin in 1968, when he scored 12 points from 15 rounds, remains the biggest.

In the Challengers category, Surya Shekhar Ganguly (7.5) drew with Anton Smirnov to finish fifth. Nihal Sarin (7) defeated Rauf Mamedov to share the sixth spot.

Spain’s David Anton Guijarro won the title with 8.5 points and qualified for next year’s Masters’ section.

The results:

13th round

Jan-Krzysztof Duda (Pol) drew with Viswanathan Anand; Vladislav Artemiev (Rus) lost to Fabiano Caruana (USA); Wesley So (USA) drew with Magnus Carlsen (Nor); Anish Giri (Ned) drew with Jorden van Foreest (Ned); Alireza Fiourzja (FIDE) drew with Daniil Dubov (Rus); Yu Yangyi (Chn) drew with Jeffery Xiong (USA); Vladislav Kovalev (Blr) drew with Nikita Vatiugov (Rus).

 

Final standings

1. Fabiano Caruana (10 points), 2. Magnus Carlsen (8), 3. So (7.5),4-5. Foreest, Dubov (7 each), 6-9. Giri, Anand, Duda, Firouzja (6.5 each), 10-11. Xiong, Artemiev (6 each), 12. Vitiugov (5), 13. Yu (4.5), 14. Kovalev (4).