your favourite for tatasteel chess tornament anand,carlsen ,sergey or some other

hmm

Carlsen's strategy has been easy to follow: draw as Black. As white, reach an equal position, then win.

An apt comparison.

carlsen is leading

In other news the sun came up this morning, the board still has 64 squares and Anand drew.

buddy still many games to go but i am still optimistic that anand will definitly be 2nd place or even win (hope is alwaez there)

Viswanathan Anand. I agree with, "Anand, appears to be experimenting in most of his games there."   Anand wants to be world champion forever, and makes the defense of his world title his ultimate priority.

Incidentally, Carlsen also won with Black and his live rating climbed to a new record (2869.7).

I think it is great that he is taking what appears to me equal positions and then winning them by superior end game technique. I'm sure Carlsen has definite flaws but how do you really prepare against Carlsen as a fellow GM when he'll take almost any playable positon and grind out wins? It's incredible to me.

Viswanathan Anand. Nobody ever takes his world championship. Ever. Anand will have to retire 1st. And right now, that isn't happening.

You are correct there. Anand has the a new life purpose. It is called drawing every chess game he will ever play from this point. His mind is telling him the perfect way to never lose the world title. Against Hou he traded off into a drawn pawn ending! Boring! Give the title to Carlsen, this situation is worse than '75.

I suppose it's natural. Lasker avoided the title match until he had no other way but to face Capablanca. Capablanca changed his style and focused more on "not losing" after he got the title. Capa himself admitted this in his Chess Career that his style was transformed and he became more difficult to beat and yet at the same time not so apt to overcome strong oppositions. Alekhine practically avoided strong opponents for the title matches. He underestimated Euwe but Alekhine managed to get the title back, and kept the title till his death. Botvinnik manipulated the rules to benefit him as the reigning champion. Fischer refused to play Karpov. The list goes on. Once you are a champion, there is a fear that you may lose the title. Hence, instead of playing chess liberately as usual, your chess becomes defensive. Perhaps it is better that the title should be abolished.

This image of Anand as a drawing machine is just wrong. He has won exactly as many games this year as that consummate fighter, Hikaru Nakamura, without suffering any losses.

Anand has a 2832 performance so far this year. His play aint boring, and he's shaken off the doldrums that affected his play for much of last year.

And yes, Carlsen will win this tournament and is the favorite to win any other tournament he enters this year.

Yeah, I was a little disgusted that he took the draw against Leko. Maybe the position is drawn, but I'm prety sure Carlsen would have made him prove it. It seem for a strong player to draw Anand all he has to to is make an offer.

Are there any stats of how many draw offers were made and refused by players?

In this tournament thus far, the player who plays white has won 26 games. Those playing black have won 13 games. There has been 45 draws out of 84 games

edit because of boo boo

I'd take the field over Carlsen in the Candidates Tournament, but I wouldn't feel good about it.

I don't know how anyone is going to beat Carlsen in the candidates? He seems to be able to win whenever he feels like it. 

Assuming Carlsen wins the candidates I still think Anand will beat him in match play . Anand has a + record against Carlsen in classical and rapid games and has proven he can win matches against top players like Kramnik, Karpov and Topalov..... Carlsen hasnt . 

I'm beginning to think that Carlsen might be the best of all time.  Like Fischer in the 1970-72 years, he is light-years ahead of the pack.

Carlsen didn't beat Aronian or Anand in this tournament and still leads by +7 vs Anand's +4. 

If the tournament was the top 4 candidates (Carlsen, Aronian, Kramnik and one other) playing a quadruple round robin, Carlsen would only be a slight favorite. But in this setting, I would take Carlsen over the field. I just don't see Aronian or Kramnik keeping up with Carlsen.