Magnus Carlsen invitational chess: Nakamura, Liren win

Nakamura won the opening game with white pieces followed by three draws.. In another match, Anish Giri and Ding Liren were tied 2-2 after regulation games, but a draw with black helped Liren emerge victorious.

Hikaru Nakamura has won three matches in four rounds so far.

Hikaru Nakamura scored his third victory in four rounds after beating top Russian Ian Nepomniachtchi 2.5-1.5 in the $250,000 Magnus Carlsen Invitational online chess tournament on Saturday.

Nakamura won the opening game with white pieces and the next three ended as draws.

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In another match, Anish Giri ended a winless sequence of 14 games but still finished on the losing side to China’s Ding Liren. After four regulation games, the players were tied 2-2.

Between the first and the fourth drawn games, Liren won the second and Giri took the third. The deciding Armageddon game, where Liren played black, ended in a draw and helped the Chinese emerge as a 3-2 winner.

Fourth round results:

Hikaru Nakamura (USA) bt Ian Nepomniachtchi (Rus) 2.5-1.5; Ding Liren (Chn) bt Anish Giri (Ned) 3-2.

Standings (after four rounds): 1. Magnus Carlsen (Nor, 11 points), 2. Hikaru Nakamura (USA, 10), 3-4. Fabiano Caruana (USA, 8), Ding Liren (Chn, 8), 5-6. Maxime Vachier-Lagrave (Fra, 5), Ian Nepomniachtchi (Rus, 5), 7. Anish Giri (Ned, 1), 8. Alireza Firouzja (FIDE, 0).