GM Pravin Thipsay writes: Finally, it seems like a World Championship match

The signs were there in the previous game. And for anyone who loves a good comeback story, Chinese GM Ding Liren has provided the best one.After staring at the bottom of the barrel after a shambolic Game 2 of the Chess World Championship against Russian Ian Nepomniachtchi in Astana, Ding has shown he’s here for the long haul. He backed his game, tried a studied variation to stun Nepo in Game 4 and level the match 2-2. (You can also read GM Pravin Thipsay’s analysis for The Indian Express of  Game 1, Game 2 and Game 3) Thursday happened to be the 60th birthday of legendary former World Chess champion Garry Kasparov. And the Russian would’ve surely been mighty pleased to watch Ding’s aggressive game on his birthday. After all, it finally seemed like a World Championship match.
Before we get into the tactics, there’s someone who deserves all the praise, and that’s Ding’s mother. It was her healing touch on the rest day that played a significant role in his mental comeback. After playing out a comfortable draw in Game 3, one could see that Ding’s demeanour changed. He no longer looked nervous. On Thursday, for the first time, he seemed extremely confident.
Ding played a comparatively less popular system of the English Opening, choosing not to ‘Fianchetto’ his King Bishop as he usually does (develop a bishop moving it one square to a long diagonal of the board). In fact, move 5, we had a position that had been played Ding only seven times before and in those seven times, he had won twice, lost once (to a certain Magnus Carlsen nonetheless), and played out a draw on four occasions.
But the major consideration was clearly the fact that Nepo had played this position only twice before, losing one and drawing one. The game proceeded on an expected path for a while, something which a strateg wouldn’t approve of for Black. Nepo’s decision to spoil his pawn structure on moves 9-10 is strategically questionable but has its own dynamics.
The position after move 10 had appeared only once before and was chosen as White in 2013 a young Richard Rapport of Hungary. Rapport is Ding’s trainer so no prizes for guessing where the Chinese got this strategy from. Ding varied on move 11 and Nepo was already on an unknown path.
Nepo’s blunder
On move 15, Ding made a brilliant pawn sacrifice, in the style of Russian World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik, who was Kasparov’s coach.
The pawn sacrifice enabled Ding to force Nepo’s pieces into an extremely passive position. However, Nepo created a fortress, a sort of solid position that is difficult to crack. move 25, it seemed that Nepo could probably hold the game with passive but precise play. Playing with black, it was the choice Nepo should’ve made, knowing that Ding can be dangerous in attacking play, especially when playing with white.However, Nepo embarked on a wrong plan on move 25 and when he actually executed it on move 28, posting his Knight in the centre, he had dug his grave. Ding made a brilliant sacrifice of a rook for Nepo’s Knight and completely dominated Nepo’s pieces to score a very convincing victory in 47 moves.
It was a delightful finish, something that even the best chess players in the world opined. Ding received a lot of flak for the opening two games but this will do him a world of good.
It was also easily the best game Ding has played on the biggest of stages, and a slap in the face to those who doubted his position as a World Championship contender.
From Nepo’s point of view, he should view this game as a strategic error. He underestimated white’s strength and believed that having more material was important. He played passively for most of the game and had he suddenly not tried to be aggressive, this would’ve been an easy draw. From move 30 onwards, he showed his desperation but couldn’t salvage the situation. all means, this was a forced loss.
Something worrisome for Nepo is that he struggles to make a comeback. He is flustered easily. We’ve seen that a myriad of times in the past. We saw it when he played Carlsen in the World Championship the last time.
Just like the first rest day worked wonders for Ding, Nepo should make full use of this rest day to plot a comeback. He should remove all negativity and know that he’s very much capable of winning.
Moves from Game 4
1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3 e5 3.Nf3 Nc6 4.e3 Bb4 5.Qc2 Bxc3 6.bxc3 d6 7.e4 0–0 8.Be2 Nh5 9.d4 Nf4 10.Bxf4 exf4 11.0–0 Qf6 12.Rfe1 Re8 13.Bd3 Bg4 14.Nd2 Na5 15.c5 dxc5 16.e5 Qh6 17.d5 Rad8 18.c4 b6 19.h3 Bh5 20.Be4 Re7 21.Qc3 Rde8 22.Bf3 Nb7 23.Re2 f6 24.e6 Nd6 25.Rae1 Nf5 26.Bxh5 Qxh5 27.Re4 Qh6 28.Qf3 Nd4 29.Rxd4 cxd4 30.Nb3 g5 31.Nxd4 Qg6 32.g4 fxg3 33.fxg3 h5 34.Nf5 Rh7 35.Qe4 Kh8 36.e7 Qf7 37.d6 cxd6 38.Nxd6 Qg8 39.Nxe8 Qxe8 40.Qe6 Kg7 41.Rf1 Rh6 42.Rd1 f5 43.Qe5+ Kf7 44.Qxf5+ Rf6 45.Qh7+ Ke6 46.Qg7 Rg6 47.Qf8 Black resigned
(As told to Anil Dias)