Anand suffers setback

By Arvind Aaron

LEON, JUNE 9. World chess champion Viswanathan Anand suffered a setback in the opening game when he was defeated by Peter Leko of Hungary in the opening game of the Advanced chess tournament played here at the basement auditorium of the Municipal Building on Saturday.

Leko, the Hungarian played from Szeged leads the four game second semifinal 1-0 with three games still to be played this evening. Delivering a sound thrashing, Leko becomes the first player to defeat Anand in an Advanced chess game. In Advanced chess, players use the assistance of computer databases and analysis engines.

The battle from the key opening stage shifted to offer black sharp attacking chances and Leko's choice of the Deep Junior engine prevailed. Both players used their cold nerves and waited for the complete assessment with Leko going down as low as 30 seconds on the increment clock to Anand's 50 seconds at move 29.

Anand who played white resigned on move 49 after he found no compensation for the rook. The game started with Leko complaining about the arrows and asked the software man to remove it. It is a feature available in the previous version. But the time this was sorted out, Leko asked Anand to turn his monitor away from him saying that he can see it and soon Anand made the same request. This friendly sportsmanship rarely exists between players in the world top ten. The players share a good relationship and Leko worked with Anand in Spain three years back and also in Lausanne 1998 during the match against Karpov. The players were also exchanging other friendly words. When Leko asked for a feature of the previous version, Anand was joking with a request to give him Chess Base 3.0 which is five versions older.

Anand opened with the king pawn and Leko responded with the Petroff's defence, one of the currently popular and solid opening systems. The opening was the same where Anand made a sizeable contribution inflicting a big defeat on Kramnik at Tilburg 1998. Anand's 15th move in this game was new and it attempted to open the queen bishop file for white in exchange for black's strong presence on the king side.

Shirov in final

Making a dramatic comeback, Alexei Shirov of Spain defeated Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria 2.5-1.5 in the first semifinal to enter the final on Friday.

In the 2.5-1.5 victory, Shirov, who turns 29 next month was defensive and his opponent played too aggressively to lose the match.

* The moves:

GM V.Anand-GM P.Leko, semifinals, game one, Petroff's defence, C42: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 d6 4.Nf3 Nxe4 5.d4 d5 6.Bd3 Nc6 7.0-0 Be7 8.Re1 Bg4 9.c3 f5 10.Qb3 0-0 11.Nbd2 Na5 12.Qa4 Nc6 13.Qb3 Na5 14.Qc2 Nc6 15.b4 a6 16.a4 Bd6 17.Rb1 Qf6 18.b5 axb5 19.Rxb5 Rae8 20.Be2 Ng5 21.Qd3 Qh6 22.h4 Ne6 23.Nf1 Bf4 24.Ba3 Bd6 25.Bxd6 cxd6 26.Qd2 Nf4 27.Bd1 Re4 28.Re3 Nd8 29.a5 Qg6 30.Ne1 Nh3+ 31.Rxh3 Bxh3 32.Bf3 Rxh4 33.Bxd5+ Kh8 34.Qd3 Re8 35.Nc2 Rh6 36.f4 Ne6 37.Qg3 Nc7 38.c4 Nxd5 39.cxd5 Qf7 40.Nce3 Bg4 41.Rb2 Rg6 42.Qf2 Qc7 43.Rb6 Qc3 44.Qd2 Qxd2 45.Nxd2 Rxe3 46.a6 Re8 47.axb7 Rb8 48.Kf2 Rf6 49.Nc4 Kg8 0-1.

GM V.Topalov-GM A. Shirov, semifinals, game one, Advanced Chess, French defence, C11: 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 dxe4 5.Nxe4 Nbd7 6.Nf3 Be7 7.Nxf6+ Bxf6 8.h4 c5 9.Qd2 cxd4 10.Nxd4 0-0 11.0-0-0 h6 12.Nf3 Qb6 13.c3 e5 14.Be3 Qa5 15.g4 e4 16.g5 Be7 17.gxh6 Qxa2 18.Qd4 Nf6 19.hxg7 Rd8 20.Bc4 Qa1+ 21.Kc2 Qa4+ 22.Bb3 Qxd4 23.Nxd4 Kxg7 24.Rdg1+ Kh7 25.Bxf7 Rf8 26.Bg6+ Kh8 27.Nf5 Bxf5 28.Bxf5 Nd5 29.Bxe4 Nxe3+ 30.fxe3 Rf2+ 31.Kb1 Bc5 32. Rg5 Bxe3 33.Rh5+ Kg7 34.Re1 Bb6 35.Rg5+ 1-0.

GM A.Shirov-GM V.Topalov, game two, Sicilian Sveshnikov, B33: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e5 6.Ndb5 d6 7.Bg5 a6 8.Na3 b5 9.Bxf6 gxf6 10.Nd5 f5 11.Bxb5 axb5 12.Nxb5 Ra4 13.b4 Rxb4 14.Nbc7+ Kd7 15.0-0 Qxc7 16.c3 Rxe4 17.Qh5 Kd8 18.Nxc7 Kxc7 19.Qxf7+ Be7 20.Rab1 Ba6 21.Rfd1 Rf8 22.Qb3 Rb8 23.Qe6 Rxb1 24.Rxb1 Bd3 25.Rd1 f4 26.Qd5 Bc2 27.Rc1 Re2 28.a4 e4 29.a5 Bd3 30.Ra1 Rb2 31.c4 Rb7 32.a6 Ra7 33.f3 Ne5 34.fxe4 Bxc4 35.Rc1 Rxa6 36.Rxc4+ Nxc4 37.Qxc4+ Rc6 38.Qf7 Kd8 39.Qg8+ Kd7 40.Qxh7 Rc5 41.Qf7 Rc1+ 42.Kf2 Rc8 43.Qf5+ Kc7 44.Qe6 1-0.

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