Aronian versus Carlsen

DRAW!!
A very pragmatic decision.
I wonder how it will effect the overal standings by the end of the day. Ivanchuk versus Anand is also drawn.


A Queen's Indian, with 4.g3 and they both fianchetto on the a8-h1 diagonal. White doesn't castle until move 13 and plays 6.Nc3 instead .
He manages to block the diagonal with 8.d5 to facilitate -e4-. Move 9 produced a Novelty, but I'm not sure whether for Aronian or Carlsen. I could not find any 9.cxd5 in my own databases.

13....Nd4 was played so fast that it must have been home prep. It set in motion a train of virtually forced moves with Carlsen yet again starting a Pythonesque ( and I don't mean 'Monty', but 'Karpov') trail which imprisoned Aronian and immobilized both his Rooks and his DSB.

Doubling pawns never seems to worry Magnus, and here it actually looked helpful. With 22....d5 he has his opponent locked in a cage, from which it proves hard to escape.

What goes through Carlsen's mind? How does he see it? Surely not the way we do. He makes it such fun for us observers.







Oh, I do nice work :-)