Chapter 610: Sheva VS Vincent Keymer! (III)
Sheva started to get bored here.
His shoulder slumped, and if only there were no chessboard on the table, he would’ve put his body there in a slouching manner. The boy also stifled a big yawn from escaping, yet the sleepiness was clearly shining in his eyes.
The gesture was a little bit rude, but at this point, no one could really blame him.
This was what the boy hated the most about the classical format. The time here was too long, and if his opponent wasted it sweetly, he had to wait without knowing when this was over, and it was something that could easily exhaust his mental state. The stress level here was definitely too much to handle.
’Yeah, no wonder Magnus gives up the classical chess...’ He smiled wryly.
Unfortunately, Sheva was not Magnus. If the latter retired from classical chess, a lot of high-end tournaments would still chase him to play in any other formats, eager to have the GOAT descending on their field, even just for publicity matters. However, Sheva couldn’t do that yet, since he hadn’t achieved anything grand in his career.
’Yeah, maybe, after I win five more world classical championships, I can just retire peacefully like him.’ Sheva’s mind wandered a little bit too far in the future.
It had been about twenty minutes since the last move was made, and Vincent Keymer still didn’t budge, turning into the monkey king himself. The German GM stood still, not even blinking at all during that time. Honestly, it was an impressive sight, if only it wasn’t Sheva who had to wait here.
To make it worse, though, this wasn’t the first time he received the silent treatment from Vincent Keymer. Even before this move, the German boy had already started wasting a lot of time thinking about even the simplest move on the board. It seemed the intelligence Sheva read before was right. Vincent Keymer liked to overcomplicate things on the board.
Knowing that it wouldn’t be long before the move was made, Sheva decided to get up as well. He noticed several players observing his game a couple of times earlier, and now, it was his turn to do the same for them.
The boy stretched a little bit, trying to get rid of the stiffness in his shoulder.
’Urgh... So, which game should I go first? Hmm... Of course, it would be him!’
Sheva didn’t hesitate, walking straight to table one where Gukesh was fighting against Nils Grandelius. The scene was quite chaotic there, with so many pieces staring against each other. It was the kind of situation where the stalemate was so weak, and a slight pull on the trigger would break everything down instantly.
Still, it was not hard to evaluate which one was better here.
’Damn, Gukesh’s battery of dark bishop and queen is good. They are staring straight at Grandelius’s kingside, and without a pawn there as a deterrence, with a little bit more support, Gukesh would be able to plant a strong piece on that side. It seems he is still going to win this game.’
Sheva clicked his tongue in annoyance, hoping that an upset would happen on that board. However, he shook his head, thinking that it was unrealistic.
The progress didn’t really surprise him. Even before the tournament began, Gukesh was the favorite here, what with him being the highest-rated player among them all. While Nils Grandelius managed to get a win against Arjun Erigaisi in the last round, his chances were still quite low to create something here.
He also didn’t forget to take a look at the other games, just to find out that all of them were still entangled in a tough and complicated positional battle.
’Well, this is understandable, huh?’ Sheva bobbed his head up and down while glancing at the other boards. ’After the explosive first two rounds, some players, especially the older ones, will feel tired and go for a more conservative method. Some draws are definitely unavoidable.’
After strolling around for a while, Sheva was finally back at his own table. Fortunately, Vincent Keymer had already made his move, so it was time for him to take charge. Still, the situation was quite dead in this position, and except for something going south, there was no way Sheva could get an upper hand in this game.
’Oh, let’s just wait until he is in a time of trouble.’ Sheva took a glance at the clock next to the board.
After burning most of his time in the last few moves, Vincent Keymer only had 23 minutes left, far behind compared to Sheva, whose time was still around 52 minutes. That was a huge difference, especially since the game was still at the 24th move right now.
Based on how Vincent Keymer always overthought everything and spent so much time on a simple move, the German prodigy would be struggling soon, and Sheva believed that it would be his chance to strike back.
’Not that I need it since my style is his kryptonite, but thanks for the intelligence anyway, Dmitrij.’ He thought inwardly, giving his gratitude to his friend for last night’s call.
Indeed, what Sheva thought became reality soon enough. Vincent Keymer started to get stressed after his time was so down like this, as he started to make some low-level, inaccurate moves.
Those weren’t that bad, like misplacing the rook one square away that would make him lose a tempo, holding back the pawn when he should be aggressive, or probably moving his king when he didn’t know what to move. Everything was so subtle, but when it was accumulated, Sheva suddenly gained +1.4 advantage out of nowhere.
However, this was the endgame phase. Not all the advantages could be seen with clear eyes, and in Sheva’s case, this was exactly what happened. The boy still thought that the game was equal, and he didn’t try to think further on where his advantage was, let alone how to take care of it.
No, Sheva still treated everything normally, and without him even noticing, the evaluation bar slowly but surely moved back to the game, and with almost all the pieces off the board, everyone could draw a conclusion here.
The game would end in a draw.