Wesley So continues the domination! ⎸YNM 2018, day 2

Wesley So vs Anish Giri, English Opening, A15 Anglo-Indian Defense
2018 Your Next Move (Rapid), Day 2, Round 4, Leuven, 06/13/18

Wesley is at 5/6 after the first six rounds! This score is absolutely astonishing! On day two he defeated Grischuk and Giri and drew Aronian, and all the games were played on a super-strong level. He chose lines which were just risky and aggressive enough to put his opponents on tilt and force them into making a mistake.

In round 4 he faced Anish Giri in a theoretical Anglo-Indian defense. They played about 15 moves of main-line theory before Anish deviated slightly and went for a less known continuation. Wesley So reacted well. He started to gain the initiative by (perhaps) counterintuitively trading off the Catalan bishop on g2. This got rid of black’s bishop that controlled a lot of central squares and white’s queenside pressure amplified. Giri soon made a mistake which Wesley pounded on right away and got a better, almost winning position. He tactically won a pawn and the rest is history.

Standings after day 2:
Wesley So 5/6
Levon Aronian 4/6
Sergey Karjakin 3.5/6
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave 3.5/6
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov 3.5/6
Hikaru Nakamura 3/6
Viswanathan Anand 2/6
Alexander Grischuk 2/6
Anish Giri 2/6
Fabiano Caruana 1.5/6

Game moves:
1. c4 Nf6 2. g3 e5 3. Bg2 d5 4. cxd5 Nxd5 5. Nc3 Nb6 6. Nf3
Nc6 7. d3 Be7 8. O-O O-O 9. Be3 Be6 10. Rc1 Nd5 11. Nxd5 Bxd5
12. Qc2 Re8 13. a3 a6 14. Rfd1 Bf6 15. Nd2 Bxg2 16. Kxg2 Bg5
17. Bxg5 Qxg5 18. e3 Qe7 19. Ne4 Rac8 20. Nc5 Nd8 21. d4 e4
22. d5 f5 23. Nxa6 Nf7 24. d6 Nxd6 25. Nxc7 Red8 26. Qb3+ Qf7
27. Ne6 Rxc1 28. Rxc1 Re8 29. Nd4 Qxb3 30. Nxb3 Kf7 31. Nd4 g6
32. Rc3 Kf6 33. Rb3 Re7 34. a4 Ke5 35. a5 Kd5 36. Rb6 Rf7
37. b3 g5 38. a6 bxa6 39. Rxa6 Nb7 40. Rb6 Nd6 41. Ra6 Nb7
42. Rh6 Nd6 43. Rh5 Rg7 44. Rh6 Rf7 45. Rh5 Rg7 46. h4 gxh4
47. Rxh4 Ke5 48. Rh6 Rf7 49. Rh5 Kf6 50. Rh6+ Ke5 51. Kh3 Rb7
52. Rh5 Kf6 53. Rh6+ Ke5 54. Kh4 Nb5 55. Ne2 Re7 56. g4 Nd6
57. Nd4 1-0

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