The last round of this year's tournament will provide us with an encounter for first place between Anish Giri and Jon Ludvig Hammer. This was the outcome of the results in the fourth round. Giri will have the white pieces and is therefore slight favourite to win the tournament.
The fourth round was more peaceful than the previous ones and included two draws.
The first pair to finish was Jonny Hector and Anish Giri. Hector chose a well-known drawish variation in the Four Knights Opening. Although he didn't play the most cautious move (9.Qe2 instead of 9.Be2) it soon became obvious that the game would end in a draw.
Pia Cramling played an aggressive game against Nils Grandelius and castled queenside in the eleventh move. Grandelius probably didn't react in the best manner and if Cramling had played 14.Bc4, she would have had the same position as in the game but with the light-squared bishop on c4 instead of f1 (after 14...Bf5 15.Nxd7+ Bxd7 16.g4) which is a huge improvement. After the game continuation Grandelius obtained counterplay on the queenside and Cramling was forced to make a draw.
The game between Jon Ludvig Hammer and Tiger Hillarp Persson reached the Paulsen Variation of the Sicilian in a roundabout manner. Hammer's 7.Qe2 is rare and Hillarp's reply was probably incorrect since it allowed Hammer to play e4-e5 a few moves later. Hillarp tried to free his passive position with 17...f6 which was probably ok, the big mistake came one move later when he decided to avoid the exchange of queens on g2. After this, White could penetrate Black's position and only a couple of moves later the attack on g7 could not be defended. Hillarp had to surrender material to avoid immediate defeat but Hammer had no problems in securing the win soon afterwards.