Candidates Final Underway In Kazan

The final of the Candidates matches to decide who will challenge world champion Vishy Anand for the title next year got underway today in Kazan.

Alexander Grischuk from Russia and Boris Gelfand of Israel played the first game of a six-game match, with Grischuk having the white pieces.

Grischuk looks like he is actually going to fight for wins with the white pieces against Gelfand, breaking with his bizarre but succesful strategy in the quarter-final and semi-final.

However, it didn't work today. Despite achieving a very pleasant position out of the opening, Grischuk was unable to make his queen-side pawn majority count due to accurate defence from Gelfand.

A tough first game for Gelfand, but he made the best of a bad (opening) job and survived to take his turn with the white pieces in game two.

All in all, a fascinating start to the final, but if the players could see their way to producing a few decisive games soon I'm sure we would all be very grateful!

Gelfand spent a long time debating his 14th move

The second match game starts on 20 May at the usual time of 3pm in Kazan (11:00 UTC, 07:00 Eastern).  Live coverage is available at the official website, and excellent live video of the playing hall is available here (with Russian commentary).