A tale of two tournaments

The start of the year sees the elite of the chess world divided between Wijk aan Zee in Holland and the Gibraltar Masters. In Gibraltar, from where I am writing this column, grandmasters such as Wesley So, Lev Aronian and Hikaru Nakamura cross swords with the British aspirants Michael Adams, Gawain Jones and Nigel Short. In Wijk aan Zee, the world champion Magnus Carlsen reasserted his authority with a decisive victory. Leading scores were: Carlsen 9/13; Giri 8½; Nepomniachtchi, Ding and Anand 7½.
 
Van Foreest-Carlsen: Wijk aan Zee 2019
(see diagram 1)
 
Here the Dutch grandmaster made a brave (possibly foolhardy) decision to take Carlsen on in the line of the Sicilian Defence that Carlsen used very successfully in his world championship match against Fabiano Caruana. Carlsen easily obtained a comfortable position and broke through in the middlegame as follows. 25 … f4 26 gxf4 Rxf4 27 Rg1 Bg6 28 Ka1 Raf8 29 c5 Rxf2 30 Qc3 Qxc5 31 Qxc5 dxc5 32 d6 Kh7 33 d7 Nf3 White resigns
 
Carlsen won two key endgames at Wijk aan Zee, on both occasions demonstrating very deft handling of two minor pieces against a rook.