Wesley So is on course for a third Meltwater Champions Chess Tour win after taking a convincing first-day lead in the Chessable Masters final.
The reigning US Champ and World Fischer Random king thrashed Vietnam’s Liem Quang Le with a game to spare to go 1-0 up in matches. So now needs just a draw tomorrow to clinch the Chessable Masters and get within touching distance of World Champion Magnus Carlsen on the overall Tour leaderboard.
The ruthless So started the day by taking full advantage of a big blunder from his opponent in Game 1.
After a draw in Game 2, Liem then collapsed spectacularly to gift So the win that killed the first match of the final. So swooped in to launch a devastating attack.
Liem said his performance was a “big disappointment” and that he had struggled to focus.
So said: “Even though I won today I can’t relax or put a back pedal on it because Liem is very capable of coming back tomorrow.”
Meanwhile, the battle for third place continues between Armenia’s Levon Aronian and the Russian Vladislav Artemiev as the Russian GM managed to tie the match after winning Game 4.
Today’s final decider kicks off again at 17:00 CEST.
All matches in the Chessable Masters are hosted in chess24.com’s playzone and available to watch on the platform’s Twitch and YouTube channels for free.
The Chessable Masters is the penultimate leg of the Meltwater Champions Chess Tour before the Finals event in San Francisco, where the ultimate winner will be crowned the world’s best online chess player.
For further information, please contact:
Leon Watson, PR for Play Magnus Group
leon@chessable.com
+44 7786 078 770
