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Chess.com Isle of Man: Aronian 'Bluffs' While Vidit Sacrifices Queen Again

It wasn't a safe day to be a super GM, but Maxime Vachier-Lagrave played a convincing game. | Photo: Maria Emelianova/Chess.com.
_{Levon Aronian defeated Dennis Wagner with some risky play. | Photo: John Saunders/Isle of Man Chess. | Photo: John Saunders/Isle of Man Chess.}

Written by Mike Klein | Read the full report at https://www.chess.com/news/view/aronian-bluffs-while-vidit-sacrifices-queen-again-in-isle-of-man-round-2

It's been several years since the Chess.com Isle of Man International was a combination chess and poker event, but GM Levon Aronian showed in today's round two that there's still room for bluffing. On top board, he played a calculated risk that worked to move him to 2.0/2, where he was joined one board lower by a birthday boy. GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave gave himself the best 28th birthday gift—a winning rook ending.

Boards 3-5 weren't so lucky. Whereas yesterday GM Anish Giri led the list of elite players ceding a draw, today three more household names followed suit. GMs Viswanathan Anand, Alexander Grischuk, and Sergey Karjakin all yielded half-points on those next three boards, unable to keep pace with their usual colleagues.

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