All five games were drawn today in round eight of the 2021 Sinquefield Cup. GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave maintains his half-point lead over the trio of American GMs Fabiano Caruana, Wesley So, and Leinier Dominguez. The rest of the field can only watch from afar.

Sinquefield Cup | Round 8 Standings

The first game on the record was a draw between Vachier-Lagrave and So. In the line of the Anti-Berlin that has a very drawish reputation Maxime gave it a bit of a push, but wisely decided against crossing the line. It goes without saying that Wesley was very solid throughout.

Caruana prepared an old line of the Italian for his game with GM Peter Svidler. Fabiano built some advantage on the clock and was looking forward to converting his extra pawn in the endgame with opposite color bishops and rooks.

However, Peter is not the shadow of himself he was in the first half of the tournament. The rest day allowed him to recharge his batteries, and now he plays with confidence. Black didn’t have many problems reaching a draw.

The Dominguez versus GM Sam Shankland game was a Najdorf, but instead of following the main lines, Leinier took the game in quieter waters by moving his knight to f3. The game quickly left theoretical paths, thanks to Shankland’s provocative play. If anyone had winning chances, it was Sam, but his extra pawn wasn’t quite enough.

GM Dariusz Swiercz played a good, consistent game against GM Richard Rapport. The London System he opened the game with soon transposed into a Queen’s Gambit/Slav Defense structure where White enjoyed a small but enduring plus. Rapport’s double pawns on the f-file made his king less safe, and Richard tried to use the g-file for his counterattack.

Just as matters were coming to a head, Swiercz’s time trouble interfered, and the game went into a drawn rook endgame.

Now to the Game of the Day. Both GM Jeffery Xiong and GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov suffered painful losses yesterday, but they didn’t let that dampen their fighting spirit.

One last effort tomorrow. The games to watch are Mamedyarov-Vachier Lagrave, So-Dominguez, and Rapport-Caruana.

All Games Round 8

The 2021 Sinquefield Cup tournament is the last stop of the 2021 Grand Chess Tour. Games started on August 17 with 10 of the best chess players in the world competing for a piece of the $325,000 prize fund.