Magnus Carlsen v Ian Nepomniachtchi: World Chess Championship Game 9 – live!

Carlsen spends 10 minutes on his sixth move. Ultimately, he goes with the predicted 6. … Nf6, transposing into a more mainstream position. Nepomniachtchi answers with 7. Nbd2.

A quick note on the scale of the task facing Nepomniachtchi. The world No 5 is attempting to become only the third player in the 135-year history of world championship matches to win after trailing by two or more points.

The others were Max Euwe, who trailed 5-2 against Alexander Alekhine before winning 15½-14½ in 1935, and Bobby Fischer, who trailed 2-0 against Boris Spassky before winning 12½-8½ in 1972.

Nepomniachtchi waits three minutes before playing 4. Nf3. Carlsen immediately answers with 4. … Nc6. A much slower pace today relative to Nepomniachtchi’s other white games and surprisingly aggressive for black. And after 5. O-O Bc5, we’re already in rare territory: only six games in the database have followed this line and none at the highest level. Nepomniachtchi follows with 6. d3.

New haircut, new opening. No closed Ruy Lopez today. Nepomniachtchi opens with 1. c4, the English Opening. Carlsen plays into the Agincourt Defense (1. … e6 2. g3 d5 3. Bg2) and is now taking his time here. And after four minutes he plays the very ambitious 3. … d4. Game on!

The biggest news of the morning: Ian Nepomniachtchi has cut off his man bun. The challenger appears to have had a haircut on the rest day and has turned up to the playing hall today with a brand new look.

A quick refresher on the format for this world championship match. It will consist of 14 classical games with each player awarded one point for a win and a half-point for a draw. Whoever reaches seven and a half points first will be declared the champion. (Carlsen leads 5-3 over Nepomniachtchi after Sunday’s second win.)

The time control for each game is 120 minutes for the first 40 moves, 60 minutes for the next 20 moves and then 15 minutes for the rest of the game plus an additional 30 seconds per move starting from move 61.

If the match is tied after 14 games, tie-breaks will be played on the final day (16 December) in the following order:

• Best of four rapid games with 25 minutes for each player with an increment of 10 seconds after each move.

• If still tied, they will play up to five mini-matches of two blitz games (five minutes for each player with a three-second increment).

• If all five mini-matches are drawn, one sudden-death ‘Armageddon’ match will be played where White receives five minutes and Black receives four minutes. Both players will receive a three-second increment after the 60th move. In the case of a draw, Black will be declared the winner.

Notably, Carlsen’s second and third title defenses both came down to tiebreakers. But many believe the increased length of this year’s match (from 12 to 14 games) and the stylistic matchup at hand promises a decisive result in regulation.

Hello and welcome back for the ninth game of the World Chess Championship. The overall score in the showdown between Magnus Carlsen and Ian Nepomniachtchi is 5-3 to Carlsen after the Norwegian’s breakthrough wins in Game 6 and Game 8, putting the Russian challenger into something of a desperate situation with six contests remaining.

On Sunday, a fatal blunder by Nepomniachtchi donated a pawn to Carlsen in the middlegame, gifting the 31-year-old world champion an advantage he leveraged until the Russian challenger resigned after 4hr 6min.

For anyone just coming aboard, Carlsen, who turned 31 last week, has been at No 1 in the Fide rankings for 10 straight years and was considered the world’s best player even before he dethroned Vishy Anand for the title in 2013. Nepomniachtchi, also 31, is ranked No 5, having earned his place at the table by winning the eight-man candidates tournament in April.

The best-of-14-games match is taking place at the Dubai Exhibition Centre with the winner earning a 60% share of the €2m ($2.26m) prize fund if the match ends in regulation (or 55% if it’s decided by tie-break games, as happened in Carlsen’s second and third title defenses).

We’re a little under a half-hour from today’s first move. Will we see Nepomniachtchi play yet another closed Ruy Lopez? Or will the challenger go for broke as the situation demands?