A highly instructive Queen s Gambit Declined Magnus Carlsen vs Nodirbek Abdusattorov

Welcome everyone for the battle between team WR Chess and Uzbekistan. This is the big fight and you know both teams want to go ahead and fight for the bronze medal here. It's Magnus Carlsen versus Norderbek Abdus Sattarov at the World Blitz Team Championships 2026. Handshake and off we go. Pawn to d4 by Magnus, d5, c4. We have the Slav. Knight f3, knight f6. Look at the speed at which Norderbek is playing. He plays his pawn to e6. This is known as the semi-slav Magnus waiting here. Should he go for sharp line? Should he go for something more positional is what he is thinking. It's three minutes plus two seconds increment and already Norderbek is at three minutes seven seconds. Wow! You can see Magnus has slowed down a bit. He goes cd5, ed, bishop f4. Okay, what is Norderbek going to do? Bishop d6 looks like a normal move. He goes knight h5. Bishop comes to g5 attacking the queen. Now you don't want to be playing your pawn to f6 because then the knight cannot go back. That's a bit weird. So he plays bishop e7 offering a trade. Magnus takes, queen takes. Pawn to e3 to get your bishop out and Norderbek brings his knight back. Bishop comes out to d3. Now he goes bishop to g4 pinning the knight and now the idea is that you get your knight out, you castle and it seems like black has done very well out of the opening. What is Magnus going to do to pose problems to Norderbek here? One way is to ask questions to this bishop by playing pawn to h3 but he doesn't do that. He plays queen b3 and I am a bit surprised because you know the b7 pawn is defended but if you don't do anything, the knight will jump to e5 and attack your bishop. So I think Norderbek should take the knight on f3 but in doing so, he will sharpen the game and he takes it, bishop f3. G takes f3 and now it's not so easy to develop the knight because b7 is hanging. So maybe you have to do something else. Castle seems like a natural way to go but first he plays queen c7. Interesting! He wants to get knight d7 and the queen to defend the b7 pawn. 2 minutes 19 seconds for Norderbek, 2 minutes 12 seconds for Magnus. Magnus goes rook c1. He's setting up some ideas of knight takes d5, knight takes d5, queen takes d5, pawn takes and the rook is opposite the black queen. That's what he wants to do. He plays queen b6 offering a trade of queens Knight to a4, takes, pawn takes and now knight to d7 by Norderbek. b4 played by Magnus. He's playing this positionally and a6 played to stop any b5 plans. Magnus goes king d2. He knows that his king is quite safe in the center. Such endgames are always very dangerous to play against Magnus because he's just so good. h4, he tries to gain space on the king side. Also create some kind of a tension with h5. Norderbek goes king d8, knight jumps to c5, king comes up to c7 to defend the b7 pawn. It seems like the position is roundabout even here and Magnus has to come up with a plan. He can't play b5 break, he can't play h5 break. So he goes rook a1. I'm wondering what is his plan now for Magnus. And Norderbek goes rook d8. He's playing this calmly. He knows that he doesn't have to hurry. Rc1 and I think Magnus is lurking around for some sacrifices that can happen on these squares. Knight goes to e8, a lovely move. The knight is coming to the square which is the most ideal for this structure. Knight on d6 just stops every single white plan. And I think Magnus realizes this that actually now he has no real advantage. He goes h5 and tries to create tension on the king side. Knight d6 played by Norderbek. Okay, you might hear some announcements here as we are at the airport recording this Knight f6 asking the pawn on h5. He takes, pawn takes and now black is happy with the position. Magnus needs to decide now what's the next break. I believe that a timely e4 is what he is aiming for. e4, e5. If that comes in, he would be very happy here and I think he can do it because look at this. e4 defended by the bishop, knight and the pawn is a playable move. Will Magnus play it? Because then you have to look at the rook standing opposite the king. That's why he moves the king away. He plays king to c3. And now Norderbek plays rook h5, rook trade. Okay, can you take with the pawn and get a passer? Because knight takes, there are some tactics that can happen. Oh, he plays gh, rook h1, rook g8. And now the king comes back to d2. Wow, what an exciting position this is. King comes back, pawn to e4. Magnus strikes in the center. We were talking about this move. Takes, pawn takes. White's position suddenly starts to look great but d6. Did Magnus miss this? Because now if you take here, the e4 pawn is hanging. And if you play e5, I take on c5. Wow, interesting. Let's see what Magnus does here. He has a minute on the clock. He goes e5, takes and now taking the knight makes sense. Taking this knight makes sense and taking bxc5 makes sense. These are the moves that are logical. But it's so difficult to calculate this. He takes here and now notice there's 94 checked. If you take, I take. I'm a piece up. So to 94, I need to move my king. But where exactly? Wow. Okay, Norderbek has to make his move here. He has more time on the clock. One minute. Magnus has 30 seconds. He gives a check. Magnus, oh he makes a mistake. No, not really. Ke2 is fine. Because now the knight moves, you take here. Otherwise, you take here anyway. But there's Re8. He brings Re8. If you take here, there's Ng3. Oh my god. What is Magnus going to do? Kf1 is the move. He needs to play it. Or he can take on e4, knight e4 and play Rh5 and even that endgame is holdable. But Magnus has only 14 seconds. He's getting nervous. Of course, Kf3 plunders here. Ng5 check. Norderbek simply gives a check and Magnus is like what? How did I miss that? That's just a piece plunder. Because next move, I will use my knight to save. Takes 96, Rh4 played. But now all of a sudden, it's an extra piece. Norderbek has to simply consolidate. And I think he can do it. He has more time. Re8. Mistakes do happen in such positions against Magnus. But takes on h5, takes on d4 with a check. King comes to e4, comes back. Pawn to f4, takes another pawn with a check. Kf5. Knight jumps back. Rh7, Rg8 played. And Magnus comes back here. Norderbek, look at how he's playing here. He's just so quick. Takes and takes back. Rd3. You can push your pawn to d4. And look at Magnus' expressions there. He knows that it's all over. The game is done and dusted. Rb8. And now, Nc5 attacks the rook. d3 played. Rb2. And where's the finishing stroke? Oh, he blocks the pawn. Nothing really is moving here. And Magnus resigns. Norderbek scores a win. What a game this was. Very interesting and exciting. And you can see that when time is less on the clock, even the best in the business falter. Even Magnus Carlsen falters when he has less than 10 seconds. And that's why it's good not to be under time pressure.