Hans Niemann blunders mate-in-1 vs Ian Nepomniachtchi after winning 1st game in 18 moves

Hans Niemann and Ian Nepomniachtchi played out a spectacularly dramatic quarter-final in the play-in tournament which is being held to book the final slot in the 10-player Weissenhaus leg of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour 2025. Hans Niemann won the first game of the two-game quarter-final and then allowed Nepo to equalise. This pushed the contest into a two-game blitz tiebreak. The first blitz game ended in a draw. In the second blitz game, Hans Niemann blundered a mate-in-1 to lose in the quarters.
In recent weeks, Hans Niemann has been a vocal critic of Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi agreeing to share the FIDE World Blitz title in New York. Even before their quarter-final in the play-in tournament, Hans Niemann was taking digs at his opponent on social media site X.
The qualifier tournament will have its semis and final today. The winner of the event will earn the 10th and final spot to play in the Weissenhaus leg of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour 2025, which will be held in Germany from February 7 to 14.
The other nine players are Viswanathan Anand, Magnus Carlsen, Gukesh, Fabiano Caruana, Hikaru Nakamura, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, Alireza Firouzja, Levon Aronian and Vincent Keymer.
India’s Vidit Gujrathi and Praggnanandhaa were in contention in the qualifiers, but Pragg eliminated Vidit in the round of 16 before he was eliminated Javokhir Sindarov in the Round of 8.
How Hans Niemann blundered mate-in-1
Hans Niemann beat Nepo in the first game of the quarter-final in just 18 moves.“After I lost the first game against Hans, I finally woke up. I was barely awake, honestly I was struggling. I drank a lot of tea, I ate a lot of sweets, but it never helped, but closer to midnight I felt like suddenly there is some energy,” Nepo admitted later. “I didn’t think I would make it too far because I’m terribly jet-lagged after New York (where he was playing in the World Rapid and Blitz Championship).”
In the second game, Hans Niemann blundered when he missed Nepomniachtchi’s checkmating ploy.
On move 38, Nepo pushed the white queen to the c8 square (38.Qc8) threatening a checkmate on the next move. Niemann could have avoided checkmate playing 38…Qb4 or 38…Kg7. Instead, Hans Niemann missed the incoming checkmate completely and played 38…Ne3 with just five seconds left on his clock. That was when Nepo delivered the death blow playing 39.Qf8#

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