On a day when three of the four matches went to tiebreaks, it all came down to nerves and mental toughness. Playing Freestyle with a blitz time control is just very difficult, and the chess engines ruthlessly pointed out numerous errors by just about all the players today. But, as the old saying goes, the winner is the player who makes the next-to-last mistake.

Carlsen – Sindarov 2.5-1.5

“I won the war and now I want to win the battle as well,” said Carlsen after the Quarterfinals, having already clinched the Grand Slam title and its $100,000 bonus prize. It’s clear that he has now set his eyes on winning the last tournament of the Tour as well, with another $200,000 on the line.

Things started very smoothly for the world number one in the first game. Sindarov got a knight stuck on the rim and also got very low on time: after his 20th move he had as little as 1:51 left vs. more than 15 minutes for his opponent. To make things worse, he got into a bad endgame and simply didn’t have enough time to spot the one chance that Carlsen gave him.

We already know that Sindarov is, as they say, “the real deal,” and the young Uzbek showed it once again today. Beating the Tour winner on demand with the black pieces is just incredibly impressive.

It helped that Carlsen dropped an exchange on move 22, but there was compensation. Sindarov had to return an exchange at some point and the position with heavy pieces was dynamically balanced. Carlsen soon found himself in a lost rook endgame due to a few inaccuracies followed by an unnecessary check. What a comeback for Sindarov!

That meant tiebreaks, with two 5+2 games on the menu. Once again, it was Carlsen who started with a good win as he outplayed his opponent strategically with the black pieces. Also here, Sindarov was given one chance to save the game as both players missed an intermediate check, but by that point, both had about 12 seconds on the clock:

Could Sindarov do it again, and force an Armageddon game? Well, he got incredibly close in the second blitz game. He reached a winning endgame, but the remainder saw a huge time scramble in which the eval bar jumped up and down basically after each move made on the board. When the dust had settled, Carlsen got away with a draw, and qualified for the final.

“What can I say,” said Carlsen. “It was a complete and utter meltdown by both players. It was just… sport, I suppose? When I lose the second game today as White I cannot be unhappy with any win so yeah, here we are. I guess I outlasted him more than anything else but it feels good to be in the final.”

Aronian – Keymer 3-1

Things weren’t any calmer in the match between Aronian and Keymer, except for their first game, perhaps. That one was a fairly correct draw which ended in a move repetition on move 41. Things got more interesting in the next game, though.

With his ninth and 10th move, Aronian made his intentions clear: he was going for the enemy king. Or as he put it himself: “I was looking for blood!”

Keymer refuted it on the board, and afterward Aronian admitted: “This second game I was having too much fun.” Still, he got back into the game, but Keymer once again got a winning position and then… couldn’t convert it. A very up-and-down and very interesting fight!

Also there, a tiebreak was next. In what was another wild first blitz game, both players had winning positions, but it was Aronian who made the next-to-last mistake. He first outplayed his opponent to reach a winning position, then gave it all away, but thanks to a huge blunder from Keymer he won it anyway (see below). In the last blitz game, Aronian was always in control and he won that one convincingly.

“I cannot say I’m too proud of the way I was playing, but I got lucky,” said Aronian. “One time I was sitting there and thinking… I came to the conclusion that I am probably the luckiest chess player in history because these things happen all the time with me and I’m very grateful for that.”

Arjun – Niemann 3-1

Arjun qualified for the match for fifth place with a convincing victory over Niemann. The Indian grandmaster could have forced victory already in the second game, but failed to win a theoretical rook endgame:

Arjun ended up winning both blitz games, so his victory was well deserved. The first one, however, showed the effects of the limited time on the clock, like we’ve seen before:

Caruana – Maghsoodloo 1.5-0.5

Caruana was the only player who didn’t need a tiebreak to win his match today. He inflicted the 10th loss upon poor Maghsoodloo, who, to his credit, still put up a great fight in the second game where he scored his first half point in the tournament.

But below is that first game, about which Maghsoodloo had been quite optimistic actually. He visited the confession booth for the first time today, after the opening phase, and said: “I think I’m doing a good job for anyone cheering me up in this tournament. I think my first point is coming! Maybe a draw or a win, but something is coming for sure. I have a very good time advantage and also a pretty nice position.” But alas, it didn’t work out for him.