Last update: 17.49 CETTime flies and the Corus Chess Tournament is already in round 10. Again we see the 6.Be3 Najdorf: Karjakin-Anand play their 23 moves of theory very quickly. 23...Qc6 is still known from Morozevich-Volokitin 2006 and Leko-Karjakin 2006 but the played move 23...Nb5 was only played in a game by two unknown players. Another exciting game is Shirov-Ponomariov. The variation is especially well-known for its drawing mechanism Qd3 Ra8 Qd2 Rb8 etc., but Shirov clearly gains nothing with a draw.
By the way, Mrs. Shirov has just arrived, and is now talking in the press room with Mrs. Anand about ... well, about anything but chess. The game Radjabov-Svidler also looks sharp. GM Sipke Ernst predicts a win for Svidler, mainly because of White's ugly structure of course. We shall see. Topalov has sac'ed an exchange again. The sacrifice was already known from two games, but Carlsen is thinking very hard now.
Update 15.29 CET: Two games have ended already in the A-group. Svidler wanted to show his position is a draw after all (he lost with it before), Kramnik apparently had enough respect voor Motylev, and Karjakin can resign any moment now against Anand. Bad preparation, according to the connaisseurs (see the reactions below). The game of Topalov is dividing the opinions. Some think he is completely winning, others think he will get long term problems with black's a-pawn. By the way, we have footage of the start of the round:
Update 16.40 CET: Anand has won anyway. 'I showed the worst technique ever,' he said after the game, and everyone understands why. Topalov also won and given a press conference. We hope to put it online soon! It was all home preparation, the mistake came at move 23, where Rc4? probably already loses. While David Navara is giving an interview for ICC about his game against Tiviakov, and Mrs. Shirov still has some hope of 'two in a row' for her husband, we are actually starting to become interested in Loek's game. 'Too difficult,' says Sipke Ernst, who prefers Black.
Update 17.49 CET: Shirov eventually didn't get more than a draw. He did have an extra pawn and besides the opposite coloured bishops also some rooks, but he couldn't prevent those from being exchanged, after which a win was not possible anymore. For a while Loek seemed to be winning, after Aronian's blunder, but as was already mentioned by Jeroen in the comments, his moves could probably have been more accurate and so the Armenian came out of it with just a scratch.
We return once more to the crazy game Karjakin-Anand. Their scoresheets don't seem to visualize any stress... ;-) Click on the photo for a larger version.
Last update: 17.49 CETTime flies and the Corus Chess Tournament is already in round 10. Again we see the 6.Be3 Najdorf: Karjakin-Anand play their 23 moves of theory very quickly. 23...Qc6 is still known from Morozevich-Volokitin 2006 and Leko-Karjakin 2006 but the played move 23...Nb5 was only played in a game by two unknown players. Another exciting game is Shirov-Ponomariov. The variation is especially well-known for its drawing mechanism Qd3 Ra8 Qd2 Rb8 etc., but Shirov clearly gains nothing with a draw.
By the way, Mrs. Shirov has just arrived, and is now talking in the press room with Mrs. Anand about ... well, about anything but chess. The game Radjabov-Svidler also looks sharp. GM Sipke Ernst predicts a win for Svidler, mainly because of White's ugly structure of course. We shall see. Topalov has sac'ed an exchange again. The sacrifice was already known from two games, but Carlsen is thinking very hard now.Update 15.29 CET: Two games have ended already in the A-group. Svidler wanted to show his position is a draw after all (he lost with it before), Kramnik apparently had enough respect voor Motylev, and Karjakin can resign any moment now against Anand. Bad preparation, according to the connaisseurs (see the reactions below). The game of Topalov is dividing the opinions. Some think he is completely winning, others think he will get long term problems with black's a-pawn. By the way, we have footage of the start of the round: Update 16.40 CET: Anand has won anyway. 'I showed the worst technique ever,' he said after the game, and everyone understands why. Topalov also won and given a press conference. We hope to put it online soon! It was all home preparation, the mistake came at move 23, where Rc4? probably already loses. While David Navara is giving an interview for ICC about his game against Tiviakov, and Mrs. Shirov still has some hope of 'two in a row' for her husband, we are actually starting to become interested in Loek's game. 'Too difficult,' says Sipke Ernst, who prefers Black.Update 17.49 CET: Shirov eventually didn't get more than a draw. He did have an extra pawn and besides the opposite coloured bishops also some rooks, but he couldn't prevent those from being exchanged, after which a win was not possible anymore. For a while Loek seemed to be winning, after Aronian's blunder, but as was already mentioned by Jeroen in the comments, his moves could probably have been more accurate and so the Armenian came out of it with just a scratch.
We return once more to the crazy game Karjakin-Anand. Their scoresheets don't seem to visualize any stress... ;-) Click on the photo for a larger version. 