Hivechess Tournament Season 14: Round 8 and Semifinals results!

Dear chess fans,

today the semifinals of S14 were played. These were the results:

@emic	1:3	@maestroask
@stayoutoftherz	½:3½	@fcastro177

The better rated players could win their matches relatively easily. At least, @emic could get 2 draws against the IM! That is quite an achievement!
In my first game I had even a winning position, but I screwed it up completely and later lost even a drawn rook endgame!

Congratulations to the winners!

So next week the Final will be played and the match for the 3^rd place:

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Simultanously round 8 was played, as a 4+2 arena tournament with 14 registered players (actually 13 but for @primersion I made an exception, at this late timepoint it would be unfair to request a registration fee from him as he - according to the rules - doesn´t qualify for a price (the minimum is 4 rounds played). Welcome to Hivechess, @primersion!

@eniolw was a class on his own and he could win the tournament with 17 points lead to runner-up @samostically! @rodrook was third (in what must have been one of his best results ever!), followed by @nikoszzz as fourth and @schamangerbert as fifth.
Congratulations!

Result table:

Link to the tournament: https://lichess.org/tournament/q9VTTNzd

Season 14: 02 Dec to 27 Jan 2023 / Ranking before the final round:

Rank	Hive name	Lichess name	Rating	Rounds played	Points	Performance
?	@maestroask	Odnoobraz_bcm	2606
?	@fcastro177	FCastro17	2117
?	@emic	emichessmaster	2161
?	@stayoutoftherz	stayoutoftherz	2028
5	@rosmarly	rosmarly	2048
6	@lucianosky	Pavarotty	2323
7	@lighteye	lighteye	1717
8	@stranger27	stranger27	1610
9(+1)	@rodrook	rodrook	1507	8	70	1591,5
10(+3)	@agreste	agreste	1687	6	61	1731,3
11(-2)	@vjap55	vjap55	2110	3	59	2109,7
12(-1)	@wildthougts	Wildthougts	2215	3	56	2131,7
13(-1)	@sawko	CM sawkito	2353	3	55	2259,3
14	@b0s	Da_k1ng	1561	6	55	1720,7
15(+3)	@eniolw	eniolw	2364	3	54	2188
16(+1)	@schamangerbert	HerbyW	1750	6	53	1764,3
17(-2)	@maciejficek	XM9000	1449	8	51	1530
18(-2)	@fiona777	fiona777	1441	8	49	1513,8
19(+1)	@samostically	ZGM_Samostically	2105	3	47	1922
20(+1)	@nikoszzz	nikoszzz	1871	4	44	1829
21(-2)	@tin.aung.soe	TinAungSoe	1254	8	42	1455,4
22	@sammy00	migmag	1503	5	33	1553,8
23	@kreur	Kreur	2136	2	32	2154
24	@kintokris	jonbellionfan	1913	2	30	1783
25	@vasigo	vasigo	1178	8	22	1228,5
26(+4)	@mypathtofire	mypathtofire	1290	7	21	1385,1
27(-1)	@iammanythings	iammanythings	2120	1	19	1983
28(-1)	@anomadsoul	anomadsoul	1471	2	18	1719
29(-1)	@pravesh0	pravesh007	1714	2	15	1702,5
30(-1)	@sanjamkapoors	SanjamKapoors	1448	2	15	1615,5
31	@salomijale	unknownhumnabeing	1500	2	11	1336,5
32	@kaungsett8388	kaungsett8388	1179	1	6	1563
33(new)	@primersion	primersion	1390	1	3	1337

One round to go and @rodrook indeed could jump to the top rank, with a comfy 9 point lead to the runner-up, @agreste. It could very well be, that we again will see a surprise quarter finalist in S15!

The rules you can look up in the S14 announcement post.

See you all next week for the final 9^th round and the Big Final!

BREAKING NEWS: The data and location of the World Championship Match was announced by FIDE:
It will be held in Astana, Kazakhstan, this April and the price fund will be some juicy 2 Mio.€!

https://www.fide.com/news/2180

Meanwhile, in the TATA Steel Masters 2023 Magnus Carlsen had to digest 2 losses in a row and he seems to still has not recovered from this blow! Is this a turning point in his career? What do you think?