Can Nepomniachtchi beat Carlsen?
Now that the irregular 2020-21 Candidates Tournament has ended, all focus is on the World Championship Match which is more than six months away and is scheduled to begin on Wednesday, November 24.
The Candidates were stopped at the halfway stage in 2020 owing to the coronavirus pandemic. The two titans of the brain game, Norwegian world champion Magnus Carlsen and his Russian challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi, are now preparing to do battle in a 12game title fixture with victories counting as 1 point, draws as ½ point and losses as 0. If the match is drawn, the title holder will retain the championship.
While there is much to be considered given that chess is mostly mental, analysts have noted that Carlsen is favoured to win, since he has travelled that road already and safely. He has extracted victories from Viswanathan Anand of India twice and Fabiano Caruana of the USA once while playing for the championship and defending his title. The predictions are that Carlsen will win by a 60/40 margin or at least by a 55/45 count.
If online statistics are to be believed, Nepomniachtchi has more victories than the world champion in classical chess, while Carlsen has more wins in rapid and blitz games. The championship is a classical one so readers may wish to draw their individual conclusions. Classical games last for sometimes four to seven hours while the rapid and blitz games last for minutes.
Cautioning that its figures are only from games on its database, which may be incomplete, Chessgames.com published the following statistics:
1. Nepomniachtchi beat Carlsen 4-1 with 6 draws in classical games.
2. Including rapid/exhibition games, Carlsen beat Nepomniachtchi 21 to 14 with 37 draws.
3. Only rapid/exhibition games, Carlsen beat Nepomniachtchi 20 to 10 with 31 draws.
The championship match is worth £2 million and will be contested in Dubai as part of the World Expo.