Fabiano caruana vs levon aronian biography

Two “donated” rooks

Magnus Carlsen and Levon Aronian had won the first games in the semi-finals of the Freestyle G.O.A.T. Chess Challenge, which meant they only needed a draw on Wednesday to reach the tournament’s final.

Carlsen had no trouble holding Nodirbek Abdusattorov to a draw with the black pieces, while Aronian saw his opponent, Fabiano Caruana, bouncing back and taking the match to tiebreaks.

A thrilling series of games ended with Caruana advancing to the final by winning the sudden-death decider.

In the second game of the quarter-finals, Aronian had played a spectacular attack to beat Vincent Keymer with white.

Only two days later, the Armenian-born grandmaster was on the losing side of a devastating attack — and Caruana got to play the same move that Aronian had played two days ago to prompt Keymer’s resignation: 25.Rd6

This tactical blow was not followed by resignation, as only after 25...exd6 did Caruana show the killer idea that justified the previous move — no