A Topalov–Kramnik final is theoretically possible and would be quite entertaining.
Indeed. I was thinking about that in Sinquefield Cup. What would happen if they were either in the same team (Team Randy) or playing against each other as Randy's team vs. Rex's team. It'd be awesome/awkward. 
In his first rapid game today against Santosh Gujrathi Vidit, Lázaro Bruzón Batista walked into a one-move mate. See below:
Gelfand, the winner of the 2009 World Cup, is out. Probably the biggest upset so far, along with Atabayev's ongoing match against Grischuk, whose time management has been spoiling his winning chances in this tournament.
Why is Dirk Jan one of the commentators? He's terrible. :)
Why is Dirk Jan one of the commentators? He's terrible. :)
I rather like his commentary. Though he is not a strong chess player, he has a deep knowledge of chess history, so he always provides interesting information on tournaments, players, etc. It's Miroshnichenko and Sutovsky I've been disappointed by.
Why is Dirk Jan one of the commentators? He's terrible. :)
I rather like his commentary. Though he is not a strong chess player, he has a deep knowledge of chess history, so he always provides interesting information on tournaments, players, etc. It's Miroshnichenko and Sutovsky I've been disappointed by.
Well, this is certainly true, but as it go for analysis, it's much better when two strong players correct each other about some mistakes they missed etc.
Miroshnichenko and Sutovsky as a team were a complete disaster. They really dislike each other and managed not to look at each other for over more than a week. They both tried to be the primus inter pares.
Now we have Dirk-jan ten Geuzendam who is such a weak chess player that he is useless in analysis. I just don't listen to the commentary anymore. The pits and totally unforgivable was when Hikaru Nakamura after his game came to the commentary box and at some point he said: I'd like to make a statement. (this was the day after the 'castling incident'). Miroshnichenko was so self-obsessed with his own agenda that he just didn't hear what Nakamura said. For over 10 minutes Nakamura's body language was saying: could you please stop talking for a moment and give me the time to say something. Man, that was embarrassing, I was shouting at my screen, shut the *$*% up, you &^#$)^& $#(&*%@.
At the last Sinquefield cup we also had to deal with sub-par commentary from Jennifer Shahade, constantly interrupting Yasser Seirawan with useless information whenever he was about to tell an interesting story of tried to explain the position in a way that was interesting for the stronger players and still could be followed by players of lesser strength and chess understanding.
I miss Jan & Lawrence .
I find Jan too dry. I agree with some other things you said. Though I thought Dirk and Miro was better than Miro and Sutovsky because they weren't in competition at least and that meant Miro had to explain more. Dirk has some interesting stories and it means there's more variety. He should have let Nakamura speak, I suppose there's a lot going on and maybe he just forgot.
Many top players failed to win their first game against much lower rated opposition: Grischuk, Giri, Gelfand, Jakovenko, Tomashevsky, Radjabov, Adams, and Kamsky even lost (even if I suppose he no longer may count as a top player).