FTX Road to Miami: Above the Line
Arjun’s winning streak
Two players remain undefeated in the FTX Road to Miami online tournament: Sam Sevian, sole leader with 28/36 points, and Jan-Krzysztof Duda, third in the standings with 24/36. In between the two in the tournament draw is Arjun Erigaisi, who has drawn just two draws so far in the preliminaries. The rising Indian star finished day three with three straight wins to secure a spot in the knockout.
In the other three rounds of the preliminaries, it will all depend on who qualifies for the quarter-finals of the online event. Shakhriyar Mamedyarov (18 points), Anish Giri (17) and Levon Aronian (17) are currently in the top half of the standings, but they will have to face the always dangerous Wei Yi (15), Hans Niemann (14) and Leinier Dominguez (13) ), who could top them in the standings if they get a few wins down the stretch of the round robin.
Let’s not forget that the football scoring system is in place – 3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw – which means we are likely to see a lot of chess fights on Wednesday. Moreover, the three players mentioned above who are currently above the cut-off line have already “played” Teimour Radjabov – and thus got 3 “free” points due to Azerbaijan’s withdrawal – while two pursuers, Dominguez and Wei, have yet to receive those 3 points.
Arjun was the top scorer on Tuesday, and also the player who delivered some of the most exciting failures in Rounds 9-12. The 18-year-old actually started the day with a loss.
Facing Duda with white, he had a clear advantage late in the middle game. A single mistake (see move 46) allowed his opponent to equalize the position. In the materially unbalanced finale that followed, Arjun failed to defend a difficult position with the queen against the rook and the bishop.
Managing Director Karsten Müller took a closer look.
After an anarchic performance on the first day of action, Richard Rapport has recovered and now occupies the shared fourth place with 20/36 points. In round 12 he showed great technique to defeat Hans Niemann in an endgame with rooks and black square bishops.