I’m literally so happy Ding Liren won his first game of the world chess championship. This man seems to hate chess at this point, he had the shittiest chess year of all time, everyone was making fun of him, and he got the first w. What a legend
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Pre-covid Ding was an extremely great player. Post-covid he was struggling a lot more and even talked about possibly retiring.
2023 Magnus Carlsen decided to abdicate the title of World Champion, and Ding got second place in the candidates tournament, so he would compete for the title.
He wasn't expected to win and trailed throughout the 14-game event, but then he came through at the very end in the tiebreaker round.
People saw his win as a fluke. Since then he's had a horrible year. He hadn't won a classical game in over 300 days, his rating plummeted, he seemed very dispirited
He's facing Gukesh Dommaraju, a very inspiring 18 year old Indian player who has had a great year. Virtually everyone expected Gukesh to win handedly, including Ding.
But yesterday, we saw the old Ding re-emerge and take a decisive victory over a struggling Gukesh. First games are usually draws!
It was a very exciting game. Ding seemed super weak at first, taking almost half an hour to play the seventh move, and his body language made him seem very nervous and uncertain before turning the tables on Gukesh. And at one point, Gukesh almost ran out of time after falling behind Ding
He got so made fun of for spending ages to make a move but he looked 80 years into the future and saw every possible move of every future match of his life
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2023 Magnus Carlsen decided to abdicate the title of World Champion, and Ding got second place in the candidates tournament, so he would compete for the title.
People saw his win as a fluke. Since then he's had a horrible year. He hadn't won a classical game in over 300 days, his rating plummeted, he seemed very dispirited
But yesterday, we saw the old Ding re-emerge and take a decisive victory over a struggling Gukesh. First games are usually draws!
https://defector.com/the-clouds-have-gathered-over-the-world-chess-championship?giftLink=ae9212af64459f56595d456592447c8e
Plays the French, forgets his prep on Move 7, picks a line on the spot and then just completely outplays Gukesh in the midgame.
Think it was called Shrek 2.