ADRAWO~1.

is Hikaru Nakamura. Hikaru, one of the greats of the game of chess, but recently has been talking about retirement from chess. This is the second round of Norway Chess 2025. In the first round, Hikaru beat Fabiano in classical game. Magnus is here and he beat Gukesh in the first round. So both of them on a high and are facing off against each other. Hikaru has the white pieces. Magnus too has been hinting at not wanting to play much of classical chess. So this will be an interesting clash now. Who's more ready for this battle? Hikaru, who was about to make his first move, looks around, pushes his pawn to e4. And what is Magnus going to respond with? You know, I've not seen Magnus playing Sicilian so much of late. Possible that he might go for the Sicilian, maybe the French, maybe the Caro-Kann. Well, Magnus says not today. Today is the day of solidity. e4, e5 on the board. The knight comes out to f3 and now the knight to c6 by Magnus. Bishop b5, we have the Ruy Lopez here. And Magnus, thinking about whether he should go for the Berlin with knight f6, he decides to play the Ruy Lopez with a6. Bishop comes back to a4 and knight to f6, attacking the pawn on e4 here. Hikaru pushes his pawn to d3. And now there could be threats of taking on c6 and taking the pawn on e5. That's why Magnus puts his bishop on c5, aiming here with the very well-known trap. If you take, take and take here, queen d4 nets you the full piece. So that's the reason why here Hikaru is not going to go for that piece. You will often see chess players getting up from their boards, moving around because there are other games happening on the same stage and they would like to check what's happening there. Also, sometimes they go to the washroom, sometimes for something to eat, d6 played. So in a classical game, which would last roughly around 4 to 4.5 hours, the players get up multiple times. Pawn to c3 played, making a square for the bishop, thinking about pushing to d4 at the right moment. Magnus also castles here. Now there are many calm ways to play like h3, rook e1, knight d2. There's also this aggressive way of playing with bishop g5. Hikaru chooses the more sedate option, goes knight bd2. Look at Magnus there, calmly thinking about what to do, goes bishop to a7. It's always a useful move to make. And now we'll notice rook e1, knight f1, knight g3. Sometimes you also play h3 because rook e1, there could be potential knight g4 to attack here and h3 is in general a useful move. So Hikaru does play it, pawn to h3 and Magnus now goes for the typical maneuver here with knight e7 to g6. The players playing super calmly here, rook e1. I'm sure there'll be fireworks pretty soon in such positions. In these positions which are like, you know, a mix of Italian and Spanish, knight f1, you will see that the players build up the position, the pieces don't get exchanged and then they kind of unleash fully. Pushes the pawn to d5 here. Magnus wanting to equalize very, very concretely because if takes, you can even take here and here's another tactic which you should know. Takes, takes, it feels like you've lost a pawn but bishop f2. If you take with the king, there's queen f6 check and you lose the rook. But Hikaru comes back super quick and pushes here. He takes d5, knight takes d5 and maybe d4 is on his mind because here, if you take here knight e5, we all know and he does play d4. He kind of equalizes the space in the center. So, taking this pawn was not great but d4, how good is this? Because in a way, you can imagine that now, Magnus can take. Look at Magnus, they're very calmly taking this pawn. Knight takes is kind of important because if you take with the pawn, black is already better with this solid knight on d5. Now, I want to play b5 but I'm a bit afraid of knight c6. So, Magnus first kicks the knight away with c5. Is this looking promising for Magnus already? Look at Magnus there. Sitting there, he's getting excited. One can feel it. One can feel that with black pieces in just 14 moves, you cannot usually get a better position against Hikaru and now b5. Yes, Magnus plays it with bishop coming to b7, pawn to c4, other bishop on a7 getting active. This can become supremely dangerous, bishop c2. The bishop is now actively positioned on this diagonal and Magnus plays bishop to b7, a great move. Hikaru has to be careful. Maybe a good idea is knight e3 but then the knight would jump to f4. He goes a4 and he's saying to Magnus that hey, I don't find anything fishy with my position. I want to just activate my rook down the a-file. Magnus pushes c4 and again, you have to be careful after takes takes, this rook on a1 would be hanging. So, there could be bishop takes f2 check and you lose the rook. Bishop d2 played. Oof! That's not a happy move to be making. Now, knight f4 looks good. Queen c7 with the idea of rook d8. Everything's looking really good for black. These are the kinds of positions where you have to be super careful against a player like Magnus and look at Hikaru there. He's gone into the think tank. Queen c7 played. Now, how's Hikaru going to continue? Just imagine knight e3. I have already knight f4, rook d8. d3 is weak. Oh my god! He goes knight to d4 and look at the number of possibilities I have. One of them being b4. If you take, your knight is hanging in the center. b4 is a great move and Magnus finds it. What a move by Magnus. This is now put under pressure but b3 also is an idea here and Hikaru rightly plays his queen to g4. He's seeking for his own counter play. I don't know how that's happening but like knight f5, h4, h5 could be the plan and rook a to e8 is played here by Magnus. Maybe this is a good move but there was also a possibility to just drop this knight back. There was also rook c8 avoiding trades but okay, rook ae8 feels very natural. Rook a d1. Hikaru gets his rook into the center. Not so easy to figure out how to put pressure but one idea is to bring your queen to a8 but Magnus takes on c3. I wonder if that helps Hikaru or not. Do you take back with the bishop? That doesn't feel right somehow. He takes back with the pawn and Magnus now thinking what's the best way to put pressure. Maybe it's knight f6. Yes, he finds it. Great move and maybe for Hikaru it's to trade here with queen g3. Yes, he puts his queen on g3 and now Magnus plays his queen to a5 here activating the queen. Queen g5 offering trade of queens. Maybe a good idea is to avoid it, go back. The thing is after this repetition you have queen d7 but in fact Magnus chops it off. Hikaru takes on g5 with the bishop and I believe that Magnus is a bit tempted by this opportunity to win the bishop pair and that is possible with knight to e4. Yes, he plays his knight to e4. He attacks the bishop on g5 and also attacks the pawn on c3. Hikaru captures. Magnus takes back and this does look promising because the bishop could sit here on d3 but Hikaru plays his knight to d2 and puts pressure on c4 and the bishop but now bishop d3 but Magnus goes back. Why? Why didn't he go to d3? That seems such a logical move. Maybe he was a bit afraid of knight jumping into c6. Now the knight goes to c2. Hikaru is rerouting his knight here to attack the c4 pawn and you can see suddenly Hikaru is feeling good. Magnus chops off the rook on e1. He has 11 minutes 56 seconds. Hikaru has 19 minutes 15 seconds. Comes back. Rook takes rook and black goes rook c8 and puts the rook on a good square here but kind of defensive. Magnus looks at the number of moves that have been made and knight to b4 attacking the bishop and also the pawn here. Bishop b7. Do we have some back rank tactics here with take, take, rook e8, knight f8 and then rook e7. Maybe it's possible but he goes knight e4. Magnus pushes a5. Knight goes to d6 attacking the bishop and the rook. Rook goes to b8. Not a particularly happy thing for Magnus. Goes knight c2 because I guess if he went knight b7, a b4 was possible. So knight c2. Bishop goes back to c6 attacking the pawn on a4 and Hikaru here. Magnus waiting on the board. Hikaru waiting for his move. Plays bishop e3 and offers a draw and Magnus says yeah sure and accepts the draw because there's nothing much that Magnus felt like playing and I think both the players are aware that Magnus was better out of the opening but somehow misplayed it. It was not so easy how to convert the advantage but yeah it's time for Armageddon here and we can all feel it that Magnus and Hikaru are very good friends of each other. You know they enjoy each other's company at least over the chessboard and that's it. It's time for Armageddon now.