So draws with Carlsen, stays at joint second

MANILA, Philippines – Grandmaster Wesley So drew with top seed and reigning world champion GM Magnus Carlsen of Norway in 39 moves of a Ruy Lopez to stay in title contention after the sixth round of the 2015 Qatar Masters Open in Doha, Qatar Saturday night.

It was So’s second straight draw and third overall to go with three victories to hike his total to 4.5 points, or just half a point behind Carlsen, who kept the solo lead with five points despite the standoff.

The fourth-seeded So also kept his place at No. 2 but will share it with 12 other chessers including fellow favorites GMs Vladimir Kramnik of Russia, Anish Giri of the Netherlands and Sergey Karjakin of Russia, the third, fourth and fifth seeds who all fought to fighting draws.

Kramnik split the point with No. 7 Azeri GM Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Giri halved the point with Indian GM Surya Shekhar Ganguly, and Karjakin drew with Polish GM Dariusz Swiercz to likewise stay in the hunt.

Also at No. 2 were Mamedyarov, Ganguly, Swiercz, GMs Yu Yangyi of China, Pentala Harikrishna of India, Dimitry Jakovenko, Sanan Sjugirov and Ruslan Ponomariov of Russia and Ni Hua of China.

So was facing Ponomariov in the seventh round at press time with hopes of getting good results and catch up, if not surpass Carlsen entirely, in the final three rounds to snatch the crown.

Playing white, So had the initiative and a slight positional edge in a double-edged minor piece play but Carlsen held his own to scrape out the draw.

It was a solid effort for So, who somehow redeemed himself after losing to Carlsen in their last meeting in the Sinquefield Cup in the United States early in the year.