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That's a great clip, thanks Geeker.

He seems very personable and, when giving analysis, he doesn't um and err every other word (my pet hate) which is rarer than you might think.

Brendan@98

No, I haven't ever played Danny King, though I remember him as a strong junior in the 1970s when I was taking my school pupils to congresses.

He (and Carol Vorderman) were among the Channel 4 commentators in 1993 for the Short-Kasparov World Championship. For years he has written the regular 'How Good is Your Chess?' column in the magazine 'Chess'.

King hasn't played any rated games since 2010. I am surprised how many strong players give up the game (Keene, Hartston, Mestel, Hodgspon etc.) Even Jonathan Hawkins seems to have disappeared. Actually Mestel took up bridge and is the only person to have achieved the grandmaster title in both chess and bridge.

OMG! What is going on!? Nepo had him and then moved unnecessarily quickly and has completely lost his advantage!

Still, 6 moves to time control so let's see ...

Move 35 - Oh wow! Ian has completely lost his cool, he's come back to the board but he's not even looking at it - he's just remonstrating with himself and looks like he's on the verge of a meltdown! This is painful to watch.

Stunning development.
I checked in on the game when Black had a solid advantage (∓ Informator symbol) and abandoned, figuring the match was over.
Returned a couple of hours later to see the result.
GM Leitao's annotations on chess.com give five consecutive moves, commencing with Black's 27th, the dreaded ?? marking.
There will be a tidal wave of commentary by players far more insightful than myself.

It was crazy, Geeker. The evaluation bar was showing a clear win for Nepo up until his Bb8 move (I think) then it completely flipped (as did Nepo!)

It's hard to understand what was going in Ian's head, Fabio and Tania on Chess24 wondered if he was trying to put time pressure on Ding to bring about another "freeze" but, as Fabio said, there was absolutely no need because he already had a very clear path to victory.

I don't know if you saw the last 20 minutes live but Nepo totally lost the plot, he was just staring around gesticulating and talking to himself - it was really quite uncomfortable to watch, seeing someone so emotionally broken.

Geeker, Paul - What do you think, can Ding march on to victory or will Nepo manage regain his form?

Brendan, given the course of the match to date I have to consider the result a toss-up.
Tempted to say that Nepo would be favo(u)red in a rapid/blitz playoff, but will stick with 50:50.

Forgot to mention, I gave up after 19. Bc2? [Leitao] ∓, returned two hours later to see 1-0.

GM Leitao's lead paragraph:

This was a strange game and I don't want to over-criticize its technical level, something that will certainly be talked about a lot. As Caruana said during the broadcast, at some point it stopped being chess: it was all a matter of nerves.

Anand tweeted about nerves dominating, thus agreeing with Caruana. I rate Ding as favourite now as he seems to have superior self-control. If he can at least draw with Black today Nepo will have to cope with getting through Friday, a rest day, before the final game with Ding having White.

It's the error of an inexperienced player to play quickly when the opponent is short of time. Tempting to deny him thinking time on your move, but you are sacrificing your own time advantage. I remember someone telling me of watching a Kurajica v Barden game where Barden had less than a minute for the last few moves before time control. Kurajica, with half an hour left on his clock, sat back in relaxed fashion and deliberated for ages before playing his next move. Torture!

OMG!!! Talk about coolness under pressure - I thought that last rapid game was about to drawn by repetition but Ding had other ideas!

Well done Ding:-)