The Hindu : Anand holds Ponomariov

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 04, 2003

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Sport - Chess

Anand holds Ponomariov

By Our Chess Correspondent

CHENNAI MARCH 3. Hungary's Peter Leko joined Vladimir Kramnik of Russia in the lead after defeating Teimour Radjabov of Azerbaijan for the second time in the eighth round of the 20th City of Linares super category chess tournament played at Linares, Spain on Sunday.

Leko and Kramnik have four and a half points each from seven games. With just half a point separating the top four, a close finish is on the cards.

India's Viswanathan Anand recovered from Saturday's loss to play out a draw against FIDE world champion Ruslan Ponomariov of Ukraine. Anand had the upper hand for most of the session despite playing with black pieces and a slip in time control forced him to draw his third game of the meet. He moved to four points from seven games and shares the third place with Kasparov.

A full house watched Kasparov take on Kramnik for the second time. Kramnik played black and tried the closed version of the Ruy Lopez opening. Opting for a blend of the Smyslov and Breyer variations, Kramnik took the game out of the book early.

Kasparov's 16th move drew attention as it involved a pawn sacrifice in the centre of the board. Kramnik ignored this and several other traps put up by the tournament veteran with great replies on move 16 and 21. On move 27, Kramnik was threatening to win a pawn. Kasparov's aggressive placement of pieces around the black king was not as dangerous as it looked at first glance. Kasparov sacrificed a knight on the 30th move to take a draw by perpetual checks with the other knight three moves later.

Anand played the Sicilian defence with the black pieces and Ponomariov went for the Rossolimo attack. The teenaged world champion went for an aggressive pawn move on the king side on the 13th turn. Anand sacrificed a pawn on move 24 to generate greater piece play. By move 31, white had two connected pawns but the activity of black's rooks helped lessen the danger. White's knight was trapped on the 38th move and Ponomariov was even expected to resign.

A serious blunder by Anand on the 39th move helped the Ukrainian survive and make a draw after 44 moves. Black's 39...Nb6 was winning and there was no way for white to continue. Anand's choice also helped him get a piece but white was on the verge of queening his queen knight pawn and forced the Indian to abandon recapturing a rook to stop the pawn from queening.

In the ninth round Anand will play Vallejo with the white pieces and can use his experience to win. They had drawn all their previous encounters.

Leko won with a giant tactical finish, sacrificing his queen to make a 2-0 sweep of Radjabov in the tournament. A victory for Leko came with the white pieces against the weak link of Radjabov's rather rigid opening repertoire. Radjabov was quick to reel out the opening moves in the Mac Cutcheon variation of the French defence and Leko was the first to vary on the 15th move.

The opening gave him a tangible advantage of a protected passed pawn on the king rook file. With such an ace up his sleeve, Leko would have been home in any form of ending. Leko ended the game with a brilliant queen sacrifice on the 32nd turn.

The first eight rounds have been exciting with a high percentage of decisive results. Eleven of the 24 games have been decisive. All the players except Kramnik have lost at least once and all of them except Vallejo have won at least a game. Six rounds remain to be played in this tournament, which will conclude on March 9.

The results (round eight): Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukr) drew with Viswanathan Anand (Ind), Garry Kasparov (Rus) drew with Vladimir Kramnik (Rus), Peter Leko (Hun) bt Teimour Radjabov (Aze), Francisco Vallejo (Esp) - bye.

The standings: 1-2. Vladimir Kramnik, Peter Leko 4.5/7 each, 3-4. Viswanathan Anand, Garry Kasparov 4/7 each, 5-6. Ruslan Ponomariov, Teimour Radjabov 2.5/7 each, 7. Francisco Vallejo 2/6.

The moves: GM Peter Leko-GM Teimour Radjabov, round eight, French defence, C12: 1. e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Bg5 Bb4 5.e5 h6 6.Bd2 Bxc3 7.bxc3 Ne4 8.Qg4 g6 9.Bd3 Nxd2 10.Kxd2 c5 11.h4 Bd7 12.h5 g5 13.f4 Nc6 14.fxg5 Qa5 15. dxc5 d4 16.Nf3 O-O-O 17.Rab1 dxc3+ 18.Ke2 Rhg8 19.Qe4 Qc7 20.g4 Ne7 21.Bb5 hxg5 22.Rb3 Nd5 23.Rhb1 Bc6 24.Bxc6 Qxc6 25.Nd4 Qa6+ 26.Ke1 Rd7 27.c6 Rc7 28.Rxb7 Rxb7 29.Rxb7 Nb6 30.Qh7 Rf8 31.Qg7 Qa3 32.Qxf8+ (If 32...Qxf8 33.Nb5 Qc5 34.Nd6+ Kd8 35.c7+ Qxc7 36.Rxc7 Kxc7 37.h6 Nd7 38.h7 Nxe5 39.Nb5+ Kb6 40.h8=Q) 1-0.

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