Though they lost the first match, the Masters could take solace in the fact that they had come so close to winning while playing with the black pieces on each board. On board six they picked up four points after Sindarov took advantage of an endgame blunder by his Danish opponent. 

The rivalry between the two board sixes would soon become one of the biggest talking points of the day…

UpGrad Mumba Masters 12-3 Triveni Continental Kings

True to his style, GM Alexander Grischuk left it to the last second to put away GM Yu Yangyi, doing so in style with a puzzle-worthy brilliancy on move 39.

Although the UpGrad Mumba Masters were able to win by a sizeable margin, all that mattered were match points. After finishing his own game in a tame draw, Aronian spent the remainder of the round nervously awaiting blitz tiebreaks.

Blitz Tiebreaks

With momentum sitting firmly with the UpGrad Mumba Masters, all the pressure was on the Triveni Continental Kings who had the white pieces in the first 3+2 match but things went from bad to worse for the down-and-out team.

On the top boards, the Kings found some success with Aronian playing solidly to draw with Vachier-Lagrave while on board two Yu got his revenge against Grischuk in a near-perfect game. The result was in vain though as the Masters had begun cleaning up on the lower boards. 

Sindarov once again displayed dominance over Bjerre and made it 3-0 against the King’s board six, this time going one step further and clawing back from a worse middlegame. On the board next to them, Harika once again toppled Khademalsharieh with 99% accuracy according to Chess.com’s Game Review.

The one game that stood out though was Wei-Vidit, which was one by the latter. If there’s one thing that the Kings have come to realize it’s that if Wei is losing, the team is in trouble. Vidit was all class when it came to punishing the dubious 16.c4??, a pawn break that lost the exchange.

With a 5-14 score in favor of the Masters, it started to look like the Kings would struggle to put up a fight in the second blitz tiebreak. However, just like in the regular season, the Global Chess League had a few twists and turns left yet.

The second blitz match was dominated once again by the team playing with the black pieces and the Kings were able to come back from the edge of defeat to take the finals into sudden death.

On boards one and six, Vachier-Lagrave and Sindarov won their respective games but as they were playing white, they only managed to add six points to their team’s tally.

Sudden Death

With the teams having tied in each finals segment, it all came down to sudden death. Tension brewed in the playing hall as lots were drawn to decide which players would play blitz to decide the fate of the Global Chess League.

The first players drawn were Khademalsharieh and Harika, the latter of whom had defeated her opponent by a score of 3-1 in the earlier rounds however the Iranian IM held her own when it mattered most, working her way towards a completely drawn rook and bishop endgame.

Grischuk and Yu were the next players drawn and with a 1.5-2.5 between them earlier in the day and only one draw, it was anyone’s guess who would transpire. The Chinese GM held a slight edge for much of the game but Grischuk was able to prove that he is a wizard with less than 10 seconds on the clock, forcing Yu to take a threefold repetition after a flurry of moves.

Now running out of potential pairings, the one which the Kings dreaded the most became reality. Bjerre, who had been defeated in all four games against Sindarov on Sunday, had been drawn to black against the Uzbek superstar.

Sindarov played in much the same fashion he had earlier in the day against Bjerre, slowly building an advantage and poking and prodding with his ominous bishop pair. Not wanting to let his team down, Bjerre defended like a lion with black and not only liquidated into a drawn ending but sapped Sindarov’s clock to below 10 seconds. With his entire team behind him watching on in anticipation, Bjerre kept checking the white king, forcing Sindarov to come up with a new plan.

Smelling blood in the water, the favorite pushed his king to a3, sheltered by his own pawns, and looked to be making some progress but with six seconds on the clock, he spectacularly blundered checkmate in one! 

Shock dawned on Bjerre’s face as he realized that he had just won the Global Chess League for the Kings and heartbreak on Sindarov’s juxtaposed the room.