Carlsen v Caruana: FIDE World Chess Championship, London 2018

This match between the number one and number two ranked players in the world is one of the most eagerly-awaited World Championship clashes of recent years. Defending champion Magnus Carlsen first gained the title in 2013 when he beat Viswanathan Anand. He has already successfully defended his title twice, against Anand in 2014 and against Sergey Karjakin in 2016. Carlsen has been the highest ranked player in the world since July 2011.

His challenger, Fabiano Caruana, has been playing brilliantly in the run-up to the championship, registering numerous tournament victories against elite competition. He gained the right to challenge Carlsen thanks to a superb victory in the Berlin Candidates event early in 2018 where he scored 9/14, finishing a point clear of the best players in the world. Prior to the match he has drawn to within three points of the champion on the current ratings (Carlsen is 2835, Caruana 2832). Caruana is the first American since the legendary Bobby Fischer to play a match for the supreme title.

• All match games analysed in great detail.
• Portraits of the protagonists with key games and moments from their careers.
• History of the World Chess Championship.

Raymond Keene OBE is a grandmaster and chess correspondent of The Times and The Spectator. He is a former British champion and has won gold medals in various European championships. He holds the world record (200 and counting) for the greatest number of books to which he has materially contributed, or written solo, on chess, Mind Sports, thinking and genius. At Trinity College Cambridge he studied Modern Languages and spent his finals year sharing digs with HRH The Prince of Wales. He has played on top board for Cambridge University and England and won bronze medals in The Chess Olympiads and The Commonwealth championship. The 2018 London contest was the first world chess championship to be held in London since 1872 which Ray did not personally organise. Byron Jacobs won numerous national junior championships and went on to acquire the international master title. He is a chess journalist, chess publisher and general games expert (he also excels at poker). He has been the chess correspondent of The New Statesman and had chess articles published in The Times, The Independent, Chess and British Chess Magazine. He is the commissioning editor and advisor for the world’s leading chess publisher, Everyman Chess, is the author or co-author of 18 chess books and runs a chess publishing company that has produced over 400 books.