In a post‑game interview, Grandmaster Anish Giri discusses his recent victories at the Chess Olympiad, breaking down the key moments of his latest win—highlighting a solid "hedgehog" structure that turned problematic for his opponent due to a vulnerable b3 pawn and a failed counter‑attack. He then reflects on the previous day’s match, describing how a seemingly equal position evolved into a slight edge that allowed him to press on under time pressure, ultimately securing a win that helped his team. Giri comments on the overall difficulty of Olympiad rounds, noting that early games may be smoother but later rounds become consistently tough. The conversation shifts to internet drama when the interviewer asks about Denis Lazarev’s remarks concerning Hikaru Nakamura. Giri finds the episode amusing, describing Lazarev’s brief foray into trolling as entertaining and harmless, noting that Lazarev’s comments were taken out of context and that he even beat Nakamura twice. Throughout, Giri’s tone remains informal, upbeat, and appreciative of both his teammates and the lighter side of online chess culture.
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Anish, you're playing incredible chess. Yesterday, a critical win for the team, and today also you won. Tell us a bit about your game today.
Yeah, everything worked out really well today. We got this sort of hedgehog position, which should be very, very solid for my opponent, but he made a few unfortunate moves together, and suddenly he had an issue with the b3 pawn. Yeah, and it was suddenly a big problem for him, and then he went for some desperate counterattack, but I guess it was never working. Yeah, I was just very fortunate, but lucky Yeah, yeah, once a month.
And yesterday I think it was big pressure because you were the one who won the match for the team. Tell us a bit about the game yesterday as well.
Well, to be fair, I mean, I played many years chess. This is just the— what was the third round of Olympia? No need to get too excited there, I think. Of course I'm happy that it worked out for the team. Yeah, obviously I was a little better. I mean, not really, like, I was not really— I got absolutely nothing from the opening, and then at some point he was simplifying into a draw, but then while doing it I got on a sort of slightly better side of equal, because before that I was on the equal side of equal. And then I think given how little I had before, I've kind of got excited there. Sometimes like it's relative, you know, like if you maybe had a big attack and then you end up in a position like this, you're already ready to shake hands. But if you had nothing the entire game and suddenly you have like a micro, micro tiny edge, it feels like, you know, suddenly the game got going. So I got quite excited early on and somehow it really worked out. Like I got some everything. Yeah. Everything just worked out. I don't know, I got more and more ideas and, uh, kind of, you know, he was under pressure after time control already in a very dangerous endgame. And I, yeah, won, and I'm very happy with the, with the win also because it helped the team.
You know, I interviewed Jordan and he said there are no easy matches. Like before, maybe the first, second round used to be a bit easier. Now it's very easy to win every single match. Do you agree?
I think for us maybe the first match was, uh, quite smooth, uh, as expected, but after that already it's hard. And now, yeah, for us of course every match We're just happy to prevail somehow, and yeah, we just take it.
And Denis, just one final question. You know, we have to get your opinion on all the internet drama which goes on. So recently there was these comments made by Denis Lazarev.
Oh, it's so good. Yes, yes, yes.
So like, tell us your opinion on that.
No, but it's very, very funny because there was this stream which had ten live viewers. But of course, Denis might be better at chess than Hikaru, but he's a little new to the internet, and he probably didn't realize that. That these streams, you know, there might be 10 live viewers, but if you say something juicy, internet will eventually pull it out. It was really, really cool. I mean, kind of fun to see that Denis also has a trolling personality to him, because, you know, he's usually very reserved, very shy, just great at chess, but now also quite good at trash talk. I think it was, yeah, I mean, me and my friends, we saw this interview, it was absolutely hilarious. We really loved it. And yeah, it's kind of funny how how it happened. I mean, I think it will sort of be fine for him because the funny thing is that, like, although he's very mean, he actually beat him twice. So it's kind of— you can't say anything back, actually. So it is kind of interesting, but a little out of character. But I mean, again, I think it's all good. He didn't say anything too bad as far as I know. I didn't watch the whole thing, but I saw some quotes, and I think if you see them in context, it's just good trolling there by Denis. Yeah, it's good to know that other chess players you know, get sort of, uh, get into, you know, more chess players get into some online trouble and not just me. It's good to see that.
