Bad day at the office for Carlsen…
Carlsen goes down in flames
When a master loses his sense of objectivity he often also loses the game. Today Magnus Carlsen demonstrated that this also holds for World Champions. Paired against the relatively unknown 18 year old Russian grandmaster Andrey Esipenko, Carlsen definitely wanted to win this game.
Perhaps too much. Carlsen did not play the opening with his usual precision (deliberately!?), then grabbed a dangerous pawn allowing his opponent a dream position that was easy to play and very hard to defend against.
To make matters worse, he refused to castle and soon got a hopelessly lost game when he overlooked a stock sacrifice that shattered his position. The young Russian had no problem dealing with Carlsen’s desperate counterattack. A very weak performance by the World Champion, whose play seemed more appropriate for a blitz game.
Esipenko,A – Carlsen,M
Tata Steel Rd.8
(1-0)
