Anish Giri called it a “historic moment” as he beat Magnus Carlsen in Wijk aan Zee 12 years to the day after he last won a classical game against Magnus. The day would get even more dramatic as 17-year-old Praggnanandhaa played a stunning endgame to defeat world no. 2 Ding Liren, while Nodirbek Abdusattorov joined Giri in the lead by taking down Parham Maghsoodloo.
It was a move that included a concealed trap, since the most natural move in the world was:
as suggested by our commentators, but it turns out that loses almost on the spot to
Before the rest day at the Tata Steel Masters, Carlsen had lost to Anish Giri, and in the very next round, he was shockingly defeated by 18-year-old Nodirbek Abdusattorov. The last time Carlsen had lost two classical games in a row was in 2015, at the Norway Chess event, where he lost to Veselin Topalov and Fabiano Caruana in the first two rounds of the super-tournament.
Parham Maghsoodloo bounced back from his loss against Abdusattorov by taking down a Jorden van Foreest in shaky form, while Levon Aronian grabbed his first victory of the event in his game with white against Vincent Keymer.