The 19-year-old grandmaster defeated 2563-rated Christopher Yoo with the Black pieces for a perfect start to his tournament. Hans Niemann is ensnared in a cheating controversy, with credible evidence emerging recently that he’s repeatedly used engine assistance in online play.
Recently, World champion Magnus Carlsen has withdrawn from the prestigious Sinquefield Cup after he lost to Niemann, and he’s since made it clear that he believes Niemann “cheated more – and more recently – than he has publicly admitted,” igniting a controversy that roiled the chess world.
Though it is now clear that Niemann has indeed cheated in over 100 different online games, some including prize money, there is no evidence of foul play on the American’s part so far when it comes to over-the-board play, and he’s scored this impressive victory in an environment with tightened security protocols.
Yoo falls short in the Jobava London as he plays into Niemann’s strengths
In retrospect, it was an odd choice by Yoo to play the Jobava London. Though it is an interesting sideline with comparatively less theory than many of the alternatives, it is also the opening that Niemann produced a popular and highly-rated Chessable course back in March.
An interesting and complicated affair emerged on the board as Niemann seemingly wanted to start a pawn storm on the queenside and the kingside at the same time. Though he failed to find the ideal continuation on the thirtieth move, Yoo was unable to defend the challenging position.
Yoo tried to throw the kitchen sink at this opponent, who at one point had just two minutes to make eight moves before time control, but Niemann kept his cool and easily converted his advantage after he got his extra thirty minutes to play with.
Niemann only gave a single-minute post-match interview, again saying that his chess spoke for itself, calling the game “a message.”
Aronian, Caruana, So also off to the races
Some of the biggest names in world chess are involved in this year’s U.S. Chess Championship (though world No. 6 and streamer extraordinaire Hikaru Nakamura is absent from the event): however, the highly anticipated clashes of the players in the world’s top 10 all petered out into draws, with So and Aronian quickly extinguishing any life from their respective positions.
Interestingly, it was the game between Fabiano Caruana and Leinier Dominguez-Perez that had the most action of the three, despite the fact that the players could have easily walked into the infamous draw line of the Berlin Defense. Instead, Perez played 6. – d5 and emerged with a comfortable advantage with the Black pieces, one he ultimately failed to convert.
The only other decisive game of the match featured Samuel Sevian beating Eishan Moradiabadi, converting a complicated endgame despite serious time trouble and mutual errors. In round two, Niemann will face Jeffery Xiong, who drew with Dariusz Swiercz, wielding the White pieces.
