The Hindu : Kramnik opens on a winning note

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 30, 2002

Sport

Sport - Chess

Kramnik opens on a winning note

CHENNAI APRIL 29. Einstein Group world chess champion Vladimir Kramnik of Russia started his campaign on a winning note by defeating Zbynek Hracek of Czech Republic for a 1-0 lead in a best of two round one match of the Eurotel world chess trophy tournament in progress at Prague on Monday.

At the half-way mark of the tournament, round one is completed with most of the favourites having taken a 1-0 lead. However, two of them who failed to cash in on their with white pieces are also the most enterprising players of the meet, Alexei Shirov and Alexander Morozevich.

While, Shirov of Spain was held to a draw by Mikhail Gurevich of Belgium, Morozevich of Russia was held to a draw by Sergey Movsesian of Czech Republic.

After a poor performance in the Amber chess tournament last month, the expectation from Kramnik was higher in this event. He showed good touch as he warmed up with positive play to win the black game in just 23 moves against Hracek.

By attacking white's queen, which was defending a mate threat, Kramnik found a tactical way to win a knight via a pin that forced resignation from the local player. Former world champion Anatoly Karpov used white to overcome Nigel Short in just 20 moves when the latter's ambush on the queen side failed to work in a queen's gambit opening.

Karpov, who had fallen for such a flashy start by black in Dubai from Van Wely, was watchful this time to take a lead after the first session.

Late on Sunday, Englishman Michael Adams used his skills to get past the teenaged Teimour Radjabov of Azerbaijan after winning the first game with white and drawing the black game for a 1.5-0.5 triumph on tie-break. They were tied 1-1 after the rapid session.

In the lone upset, Ivan Sokolov of Bosnia and Herzegovina shocked Peter Leko of Hungary in the blitz tie-break game with white and drew the black encounter for a overall 2.5-1.5 win. Sokolov will face Adams.

Judit Polgar recovered from a shock defeat that tied the scores at 1-1 in rapid chess to take the match at 2.5-1.5 in tie-break against China's Ye Jiangchuan. This result set up a battle of No. 1's between the No.1 ranked woman player Judit Polgar and No.1 ranked Garry Kasparov.

Earlier this month, China's world women's champion Zhu Chen knocked out world men's champion Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine in the FIDE Grand Prix at Dubai and this battle coming close to the heels of it should attract big public interest.

Viswanathan Anand, who won his first round match without any difficulty is to take on Alexander Khalifman in round two on Tuesday. Anand had beaten him on most occasions and importantly has never lost.

They last met at Dubai earlier this month over the same rapid control and Anand won 2-0. The time control here is 25 minutes to start and five seconds get added each time they make a move. The blitz tie-break games, if necessary, have five minutes to start with two seconds added for each completed move.

The results: First round (Sunday): Garry Kasparov (Rus) bt Gilberto Milos (Bra) 2-0, Judit Polgar (Hun) bt Ye Jiangchuan (Chn) 2.5-1.5, Boris Gelfand (Isr) bt Yasser Seirawan (U.S.) 1.5-0.5, Loek Van Wely (Ned) lost to Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukr) 0.5-1.5, Jan Timman (Ned) lost to Viswanathan Anand (Ind) 0-2, Alexander Khalifman (Rus) bt Viktor Bologan (Mda) 1.5-0.5, Ivan Sokolov (Bih) bt Peter Leko (Hun) 2.5-1.5, Michael Adams (Eng) bt Teimour Radjabov (Aze) 2.5-1.5.

Round one, game one on Monday: Anatoly Karpov (Rus) bt Nigel Short (Eng), Zbynek Hracek (Cze) lost to Vladimir Kramnik (Rus), Vladislav Tkachiev (Fra) drew with Alexander Grischuk (Rus), Alexander Morozevich (Rus) drew with Sergey Movsesian (Cze), Veselin Topalov (Bul) bt Vadim Milov (Sui), Peter Svidler (Rus) bt Jeroen Piket (Ned), Alexei Shirov (Esp) drew with Mikhail Gurevich (Bel), Artur Yusupov (Ger) drew with Evgeny Bareev (Rus).

The moves: GM Zbynek Hracek-GM Vladimir Kramnik, round one, game one, rapid chess, Ruy Lopez, C65: 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nf6 4.d3 Bc5 5.0-0 d6 6.c3 0-0 7.Nbd2 a6 8.Bxc6 bxc6 9.Nc4 h6 10.b4 Ba7 11.Qe2 c5 12.Na5 cxb4 13.cxb4 Bd7 14.Bd2 Rb8 15.a3 c5 16.h3 cxb4 17.Bxb4 Nh5 18.Qd2 Qf6 19.Kh2 Nf4 20.Ng1 Qg6 21.f3 Be3 22.Qc2 Rfc8 23.Nc4 d5 (If 24.exd5 Rxc4! wins) 0-1.

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