Magnus Carlsen takes subtle jab at GMHikaru with chess Twitch stream

The best chess player in the world, Magnus Carlsen, took a subtle jab at top Twitch streamer GMHikaru during a broadcast of his own, while playing with Ludwig and the Botez sisters.

The chess community is a tight-knit one, especially at the top level, but that doesn’t mean they can’t make jokes at each other’s expense.

Carlsen and Hikaru, who is the number one chess streamer on Twitch, have a long history of playing against one another.

Now, though, when streaming with the Botez sisters Alexandra and Andrea — who have openly had beef with Hikaru — Carlsen couldn’t resist making a joke at Hikaru’s expense.

Bringing Ludwig in, the biggest name on Twitch right now, to really get his chess gears going, there were plenty of funny moments between the quartet.

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Between games, Magnus said: “By the way, just to let you guys know, I’m streaming in ‘Just Chatting’ today to show solidarity with you guys.”

This elicited laughs from everyone else, in particular the Botez sisters, who have their own beef with Hikaru after he got annoyed at them streaming under the ‘Just Chatting’ category rather than Chess.

At the time, Hikaru said the Botez streams could be “an issue” that could potentially affect chess events on Twitch simply because sponsors won’t be seeing the real numbers of Twitch viewers.

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The TSM streamer has been making headlines for the wrong reasons more recently, too, with Chessbrah’s Eric Hansen speaking out against him for copyright striking their YouTube videos and manipulating their peers alongside renowned mod Chessbae.

It’s not clear how clued in Carlsen is on all of the Twitch chess beef, but this one definitely felt like a slight jab at Hikaru given who he was streaming with.