Anand was quickly held to a draw by English Grandmaster Michael Adams in the seventh round of the Corus International chess tournament.
WIJK AAN ZEE: Viswanathan Anand was quickly held to a draw by English Grandmaster Michael Adams in the seventh round of Corus International chess tournament here on Saturday.
After a shocking loss against Gata Kamsky of United States in the previous round, the 23-move draw against Adams did not prove enough for Anand to retain joint lead in this Category-19 event and the Indian ace was pushed to second spot after World Champion Veselin Topalov made mincemeat of local hopeful Ivan Sokolov.
With his fourth victory in the 14-players all-play-all tournament, Topalov (5 points) took a slender half point lead over Anand and world’s youngest ever Grandmaster Sergey Karjakin of Ukraine who was very impressive in scoring over junior world champion Shakhriyar Mamedyarov of Azerbaijan in this round.
The fourth spot is jointly shared by Adams, Boris Gelfand of Israel and Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine who all are on 4 points.
Anand could do little against Adams who was well armed in the Ruy Lopez Anti Marshall. The variation chosen by Adams was similar to the one that Alexei Shirov opted for against Anand a few years back during the Mainz chess Classics. From what transpired on the board, it was evident that Adams’ had done good home work.
He realized soon in the middle game that his position was not good enough to play for a win and the draw was signed after both players had traded a couple of minor pieces and pawns.
Topalov was back to his awesome winning ways. However, this time, he had to showcase his defensive skills as Sokolov threw everything at him right from the early stages of the middle game.
It started with a Ruy Lopez Arkhengelsk variation wherein Topalov gobbled two sacrificed pieces and demonstrated that black did not have sufficient compensation. Sokolov’s effort lasted till the 37th move.
Negi gets second GM norm: Chess wonderkind Parimarjan Negi caused a flutter by clinching his second Grandmaster norm after a fine victory in the final round of the fourth Parsvnath International Open Chess tournament in New Delhi on Sunday.
His achievement overshadowed top seed Alexei Fedorov’s winning run to the title at the Bapu Samaj Sewa Kendra. Negi defeated S Kidambi with black pieces in around four hours to earn the norm in successive tournaments. His first norm came at Hastings in England last month.
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