Tata Masters: Another draw stalls So drive

ANOTHER draw in the 10th round further stalled Wesley So’s drive to close in on world champion Magnus Carlsen Wednesday night in the all-Grandmaster Tata Steel Masters in Den Haag, the Netherlands.

Handling black, So forced the draw with Chinese GM Ding Liren after 24 moves of the Queen’s Gambit Declined (Charousek Variation), moving him to 6.5 points and joint second with French Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the 14-player field boasting an average Elo rating of 2746.

Carlsen saw his win-run end at six after being forced to a quick 17-move draw by  Vassily Ivanchuk in another QGD (Ragozin Variation).

The Norweigian icon, with the highest-ever 2860 rating, climbed to 7.5 points, keeping his distance from So and Vachier-Lagrave, who also split the point with Poland’s  Radoslaw Wojtaszek.

Ivanchuk was lodged at 6.0 with Dutch hope Anish Giri (2784), Italian world No. 2 Fabiano Caruana (2820) and Ding (2732).

Armenian Levon Aronian, who’s certain to lose his crown with only 4.5 points thus far, drew with Azerbaijan’s Teimour Radjabov (5.0).

With his seventh draw, So stretched  his unbeaten run to 53 games dating back to midway last year.  Roy Luarca