Magnus Carlsen

Untitled Carousel From Yashasvi Jaiswal and Shafali Verma in Cricket to Alireza Firouzja in Chess, new order takes over Old guard of world sports was a bedrock of consistency, skills and accomplishments. But ‘The Times They Are A Changin’

chess

Maxime Vachier-Lagrave

Fabiano Caruana

Hikaru Nakamura

: Ahead of his own tournament, TheInvitational, the Norwegian world champion suffered a setback at the hands of precocious Alireza Firouzja in the final of the Banter Blitz Cup that concluded on Wednesday. Carlsen lost to the Iranian wonderkid 8.5-7.5 after being checkmated in the final game.In a thrilling contest, broadcast worldwide, 16-year-old Firouzja, who was featured by Mirror as an upcoming talent recently, earned applauds from Carlsen himself. “Good game Alireza. I was way out of shape, but he deserves full credit. I've just got to be better, but he's amazingly strong. Full credit,” Carlsen said. Firouzja earned $ 14,000 for the win.Firouzja said he had prepared thoroughly for the final. “The only thing I think about all day is, so maybe it's all day!” the Iranian teenager said.The Banter Blitz Cup was a 128-player knockout tournament in which players were required to comment on their own matches in a live webcast. It was telecast live online.Each match was of three-minutes (for each player) duration with no incremental addition to the clock after every move, a general practice in chess elsewhere. The match was a best of 16 contests with the first player to reach 8.5 points was declared the winner.Carlsen and Firouzja will now compete in the much-awaited online chess tournament, The Magnus Carlsen Invitational, which starts on Saturday. According to a release from the organisers, it features eight of the world’s best from April 18 to 30. The prize money for the tournament is $250,000.Ding Liren,, Ian Nepomniachtchi,, Anish Giri andbesides Carlsen and Firouzja are the eight contenders. Having beaten Carlsen on Wednesday, Firouzja has a good chance in the event. “I have some chances but it's not much because I am the last seed and I am not the favourite, of course,” the Iranian GM said.