Cyrus Lakdawala - Nepomniachtchi - Move by Move

Since then, I have learned the following:
1) His name is unbelievably difficult to memorize for spelling purposes, so much so that GM Anish Giri wrote the following in New in Chess : People usually stop writing Ian Nepomniachtchis name after four letters because of the chaos that ensues around letter number 8! Maybe the proper title for this book is Nepomniachtchi: Letter by Letter .
2) Every online commentator refers to him affectionately by his nickname Nepo.
3) He is a gifted video game player, at a semi-professional level. Nepo was introduced to the video game Dota in 2006 and became a member of the team that won the ASUS Cup in the Winter 2011 Dota tournament. He also served as a commentator at the ESL One Hamburg 2018 Dota 2 tournament, using the handle FrostNova . He also plays Hearthstone and introduced fellow Russian grandmaster Peter Svidler to the game, after which the two GMs provided feedback to Hearthstone developers.
4) Perhaps influenced by the Buddha, Nepo stylishly wears his hair in a man-bun.
5) Ian majored in journalism and graduated from Russian State Social University.
6) Nepo excels in attack and open and irrational positions, so it isnt such a big surprise that he cites Tal as his all-time favourite player and the one who most influenced his chess.
7) He is one of those stratospheric players who have actually accumulated a plus score over Magnus Carlsen in classical time control games (four wins to one, with six draws) although, for full disclosure, a number of them were played when both were children. In the coming world championship match, we are about to see a clash of two great players in their primes. We can be certain that Magnus is salivating to settle a long, unavenged vendetta, since world champions insist on a plus score against everyone! On the other hand, there is no greater animosity than that of number 2 for number 1, so Nepo will be equally determined to unseat Magnus and take his crown.
Ian Alexandrovich Nepomniachtchi was born on July 14th 1990 in Bryansk to a Jewish/Russian family, still during the Soviet Union era, over a year before its collapse.

He was born into a literary family, and grandfather Boris Iosifovich was a well-known lyricist. Nepo learned chess at the relatively early age of four and it soon became apparent that the child displayed extraordinary talent. He was that kid for whom every answer in class came easily. So much so that his natural abilities made ordinary prodigies feel dumb by comparison. His first teacher was his uncle, Igor Nepomniashchy. GM Valentin Evdokimenko then took over, coaching him from age five to thirteen.

Right from the start, Ian looked like he was on a clean trajectory to potential world champion. He won European Junior Championships three times: the under-10 category in 2000, and the under-12 in both 2001 and 2002. In 2002, Ian also won the World Junior Championship U12 category, edging out another prodigy, Magnus Carlsen, on tiebreaks. In their individual game Magnus played the Black side of Alekhines Defence and lost a level game to Nepo. At that time Ians Elo rating was almost 100 points higher than Magnus, and Nepo was considered the more gifted prodigy of the two. So it must rankle with Nepo to play second fiddle to Magnus, since there is no horror greater than being passed by a player who was once lower rated than you.