Arjun Erigaisi thinks astir his adjacent determination successful the circular 7 crippled against Max Warmerdam astatine the Tata Steel chess tournament. (PHOTO: Lennart Ootes/Tata Steel chess tournament)
Dutch grandmaster Max Warmerdam, ranked nary 82 successful the world, defeated World No 4 Arjun Erigaisi successful 1 of the biggest shocks astatine the Tata Steel chess tournament. Meanwhile, determination was a morale-boosting gully for Leon Luke Mendonca implicit defending champion Wei Yi from China. Praggnanandhaa was besides held to a gully by Dutch GM Jorden van Foreest.
Erigaisi is going done the worst slump of his career, not getting a azygous triumph successful 7 games astatine the lawsuit nicknamed the Wimbledon of Chess. He’s present mislaid 4 games and drawn 3 astatine the Dutch municipality of Wijk aan Zee. What’s worse is that Erigaisi is yet to look 2 of the in-form players astatine the event: satellite champion Gukesh and Uzbek prima Nodirbek Abdusattarov.
Warmerdam is rated 2646, astir 150 points beneath Arjun Erigaisi who started the twelvemonth by entering the elusive 2800 ratings club. The conquest implicit Erigaisi was Warmerdam’s archetypal triumph of the Tata Steel event. The Indian has present dropped 29 standing points successful the past 10 days and 7 games astatine Wijk aan Zee. For context, helium gained 63 points past twelvemonth to interruption into the apical 5.
How Arjun Erigaisi mislaid to Max Warmerdam
Playing with achromatic pieces connected Saturday, Arjun Erigaisi had an inferior presumption connected the committee from arsenic aboriginal arsenic the 12th move, wherever helium played an inaccuracy and past doubled down with different inaccuracy connected determination 13.
Erigaisi played 12… e6?! erstwhile the motor showed that 12… Qd7 was the champion move. Then connected determination 13, Arjun Erigaisi made different ill-advised pawn push, this clip connected the b file: helium played 13… b5?! erstwhile the motor said that 13… Nd7 was the champion option.
From the 25th determination onwards, Arjun started to way successful presumption of material, archetypal falling 1 pawn down, past having 2 pawns little connected the committee by the 27th move. By determination 28, Arjun Erigaisi had 3 little pawns connected the committee compared to the Dutch player. He yet conceded decision connected determination 38.
For Mendonca, this is present the 3rd consecutive gully connected the trot, which indispensable travel arsenic a alleviation aft helium experienced 3 defeats successful his archetypal 4 games astatine what is his archetypal super-elite invitational event.