PERFECTION || Fabiano Caruana vs Wei Yi || FIDE Candidates Tournament 2026

Hello everyone and welcome to one of the shortest games ever played in a FIDE Candidates Tournament ever. The shortest one that comes to mind is in 2011 Vishwanathan Anand defeated Boris Gelfand in mere 16 moves. This game lasted only 19 and it's just not something you would expect out of a game that was played in a FIDE Candidates Tournament. So it's a round three, one of the favorites to win it. Fabiano Caruana against another player everyone considers he could very well you know just crush everyone because he plays very very straightforward chess and very aggressive so he could win all games he could lose all games and you know you just can never know. But yeah let's dive straight into it and here's the photo before we check out the game. As you know usual nothing out of the out of the ordinary here again if you guys can spot anything feel free to mention it in the comments. I remember when I was covering the 2013 Candidates or 2012 Candidates there was just so much stuff happening you know on every photo you know if Ivanchuk was playing in the Candidates you know there was just so much stuff on on the board that you usually don't see but so it was extremely colorful. But yeah nowadays not so much but yeah let's just check out the game. So Fabi with white opens with knight to f3. Fabi in a very good position he won the first game against Hikaru, drew the second one fairly quickly and now takes on Weiyi where Weiyi is sitting on two solid draws. We have knight f3, knight to f6, pawn to c4, we have the symmetrical variation of the English. Not something that you would expect to end so abruptly. We have knight to c3, pawn to d5, again the three knights of the English nothing spectacular here, captures, captures. We have bishop to g2 and bishop to g7. And here Fabi takes 22 minutes for his next move believe it or not. Usually you just see castles or queen to b3 those are the two main moves. Fabi plays queen a4 check and 22 minutes. Now why would you spend 22 minutes on move 7? I mean it's not as if Weiyi surprised him with any move. This is the main line, the mainest of the main lines and it's as if Fabi had a spur of the moment thing here just on move 7 in a Candidates tournament game. But okay other than playing something weird like knight d7 and blundering a knight on d5, you can't really go wrong here. You will either play knight c6 or bishop to d7. Weiyi goes knight c6 and now comes knight to g5. And okay, Fabi already down half an hour on the clock. Weiyi just a full hour and 56 minutes, so not even thinking. And there is a game where e6 was played. Some other games have reached this position but from top level chess, Wesley So versus Maxime Vachier-Lagrave from the Seinfeld Cup of 2015, that was 11 years ago, the third iteration of the Seinfeld Cup and the NBL lost this game after pawn to e6, which is interestingly the second top move recommended by the engine. Weiyi goes knight to b6 and this is the top move recommended by the engine and this is probably why Fabi was spending those 22 minutes. He was probably already calculating this position because if you don't know how to continue here, it's just not easy. Anything other than giving up the bishop here, you will win material, but you have to give up your strong light square bishop. Anything other than that and you're already worse. If you go back, then already bishop to f5 comes and black is just better. So Fabi goes for it. Bishop captures on c6. We have b captures, queen captures on c6 and now bishop to d7, sacrificing yet another pawn. Queen captures and now pawn to h6, chasing the knight back. Knight to f3 and rook to c8. So Weiyi getting insane development here for the price of those two pawns and look at the time. He still has almost full time. An hour and 52 minutes on the clock. Fabi goes queen a5 and he's already down to an hour and 18 minutes. And again, just bishop h3 blitzed out. So reaching this position, Weiyi hasn't spent even 10 minutes on the clock. And Fabi has a lot of moves to consider. He could go pawn to d4, he could go rook to g1. As bishop to g2 really is a threat, so you have to stop that somehow. You could go queen b5 check. One thing that you really shouldn't do is capture another pawn. If you do this, then after castles kingside, black is safe, fully developed, has the bishop pair, prevents white from castling. I don't think anyone survives this position against Weiyi, even a strong calculator like Fabi. So instead, Fabi went queen b5 check. Now we have knight to d7 and rook to g1. And the problem is, well, not the problem, but you really want to go bishop to g4 here. But if you go bishop to g4, then I guess it's a draw offer. Then king to f1, hoping for king to g2, and then you just repeat. Check, check, and then you go back, king f1, bishop h3 check, and you get some sort of a draw by threefold repetition. So first, Weiyi castles, so he doesn't have to repeat the position. Now he can start some sort of an attack against the white king. And Fabi plays pawn to g4. I mean, that's a beautiful move. It's the only move white has. Otherwise, Fabi's just going to be much worse. And he's stopping bishop to g4 by trapping the bishop on h3 now. And yes, the white king is somehow the position holds. And here, there are some moves to consider. Weiyi played rook to c5, which is already a suboptimal move. And this is the first moment in the game where Weiyi actually spent some time. He spent almost 30 minutes on rook to c5. I will show you how you should continue. You should play, well, either go crazy with f5, that works, but knight to f6 seems to be the most solid idea. You just go after the pawn. And now probably g5 is not something that Fabi would play, because you really like that bishop trapped on h3. And then you get something like queen a4, you defend the pawn, and then queen to c7. And it's very uncomfortable for white. Yes, you're up material, but you can't really move this knight. The dh2 pawn will fall. You can't move this knight. Imagine if you play something like, well, okay, let's not go knight d1, but let's say go knight b5. You attack the queen already, black can give up the queen, and then you have to block with the queen. Then you capture here as well, and then you capture on g4, and black is completely winning. So this is unplayable. But Weiyi went to rook to c5, and we're already on move 16. As I've mentioned, the shortest game ever that I know of from the candidates was the one where Vichy defeated Boris Gelfand in 16 moves. But here we have queen to b3, and now comes knight to e5. Queen c7, and it's still very much a complicated game. Queen c7 is such a powerful move that it does really everything, and paralyzes both knights, and it's hard to say why it wasn't played. White will get some play after pawn to d4, something like rook to b8. You get the other rook into the game as well, and then, let's say, rook a5. And okay, white is up material, but I mean, would anyone really take white here? I don't think so. You'd have to play a perfect game just, you know, to prove that your pawn is actually worth something. But instead, after queen to b3, Weiyi played knight to e5, and he already blunders the game. Let me just check. Yeah, and it wasn't even a quick decision. It was a 22-minute thing, and he loses the game, if Fabi can find it. This is move 17. If you find the next move, black already resigns. So what did Weiyi miss here? What's the trick? Try and find it while I give you a couple of seconds. You have 43 minutes to solve this one. Yes, much like, you know, many a player before him, he misses a move with the knight back. And it's knight captures on e5. Not talking about this knight, I'm talking about the knight on c3. And you can't capture with the rook or with the bishop. If you capture with the bishop, then the idea is 94. You attack the rook and the bishop here, and there's nothing. You just lose a piece. That bishop is lost, and if queen to c8, trying to capture on c1, you just go back, and you don't care. Your position is rock solid. So after knight captures, the rook captures on e5, was played, and now probably what Weiyi saw when he played that knight to e5 move was maybe knight to a4, and then, okay, the bishop is hanging, but you can play queen a5. And now you can't really capture because queen captures on a4, and black is perfectly fine here. If anything, black should be even better. But Fabi played knight to d1, and he was in this position on move 19 that Weiyi resigned the game, as there is nothing more to be done here. It's as simple as that. The bishop on h3 is trapped, and there is no way out. There is nothing. There is no move that you can even consider to maybe complicate the position. I think Weiyi was extremely disgusted with himself, and he resigned immediately on the spot, a couple of seconds after Fabi played knight to d1. And, I mean, I don't think he will be sleeping well tonight. But Fabi, going on 2.5 out of 3, taking the early lead in round 3. He's now leading the candidates' tournament. Okay, some of the other games are still being played. But yeah, with such a quick win in round 3, and a beautiful victory against Hikaru Nakamura in round 1, he has already defeated some of the sort of the main characters of the candidates' tournament, and now definitely does have the best chances of winning the candidates' tournament. We'll know more once all of the games of round 3 finish, but Fabi, I mean, this was spectacular. How he composed himself, he calculated everything perfectly. He found all of the key ideas, like that pawn to g4 move, which you have to see even when you're capturing on c6 and winning those two pawns on the queen side. He calculated it to perfection. And okay, maybe Weiyi overpushed it a little bit here after knight to d7, like we discussed. He didn't have to go for it. He could have just, you know, go for the repetition, but he wanted the win, and he got a loss. Sometimes chess and life work like that. So yeah, really hope you enjoyed it. We're not going to discuss any other game here, because we will be showing more from round 3, but yeah, Fabi is now in the lead. And also with this victory, let's not forget, Fabi joins everyone, well, everyone, Hikaru and Magnus in the 2800 club, as he is now over 2800 on live ratings, which, I mean, is just amazing, you know, winning, actually winning rating in the candidates tournament, that's something else. So yeah, really hope you enjoyed it. Big congratulations to Fabi. We'll see, you know, if this forum continues, but he seems to be a machine. I would like to thank Carsten Glicic, Derek King, Andreas Rosenthal, Oskar Nissen, and Emmanuel Silva for a contribution to my channel. Thank you a lot, I really appreciate it. As usual, you can check two of my previous videos here. Thank you all for watching, and I will see you soon, continuing to check up on your wonderful suggestions and whatever else happens in the chess world. Thank you all, I will see you soon, and have an excellent rest of your day. And if you still haven't, first link in the description below, download Lotus Chess, it is the best app to improve your chess. Guaranteed, try it out, you will love it. See you soon.