The 9th and final round of the Qatar Masters 2015 turned out to be a befitting finale to a fantastic event. Despite World Champion Magnus Carlsen (who was solely leading the field before the final round) opting for a quick draw against GM Vladimir Kramnik to cement his top spot, defending champion GM Yu Yangyi ensured that the World Champion didn’t have it easy. The Chinese Grandmaster overcame GM So Wesley in a rather interesting battle to enter a tie-break for the first prize against Carlsen.
However, the tie-break witnessed a dominant performance by the World Champion. Carlsen overcame Yu Yangyi with a 2-0 scoreline to clinch the Qatar Masters 2015, thus adding another feather to his cap. Yu Yangyi, meanwhile, finished as the runner-up on the back of an impressive finish.
Amongst Indians, GMs Ganguly, Harikrishna and Sethuraman finished tied for the 8th-17th spots.
A lot of up and coming players put on some exceptional performances. Of special note is untitled Chinese player Xu Yinglun, who notched up a total of 6 points with an outstanding rating performance of 2800, thus securing a Grandmaster norm. IMs Shardul Gagare and Vignesh NR (both India), IM Daniil Yuffa (Russia) and IM Lin Chen (China) were the other players who managed to secure Grandmaster norms. The complete norms list can be found here.
Final Standings: Here