Round Nine At Amber
Another two draws for Vassily Ivanchuk were enough for him to retain first place at Amber, but Magnus Carlsen won his rapid game against Dominguez to reduce the lead to half a point with just two rounds to go.
Vladimir Kramnik also won in the rapids against Peter Svidler to stay in contention another half point back, where he is joined by Alexander Grischuk who recorded the only 2-0 score of the day against Jan Smeets.
Carlsen starts his rapid game against Dominguez (picture from the official site)
The results in round nine:
| Blind | Gashimov-Ivanchuk | ½-½ |
| Kramnik-Svidler | ½-½ | |
| Gelfand-Karjakin | ½-½ | |
| Blind | Ponomariov-Aronian | 1-0 |
| Grischuk-Smeets | 1-0 | |
| Dominguez-Carlsen | ½-½ | |
| Rapid | Ivanchuk-Gashimov | ½-½ |
| Svidler-Kramnik | 0-1 | |
| Karjakin-Gelfand | ½-½ | |
| Rapid | Aronian-Ponomariov | 1-0 |
| Smeets-Grischuk | 0-1 | |
| Carlsen-Dominguez | 1-0 |
The standings with just two rounds to go:
| Ivanchuk, Vassily | UKR | 12.0 |
| Carlsen, Magnus | NOR | 11.5 |
| Kramnik, Vladimir | RUS | 11.0 |
| Grischuk, Alexander | RUS | 11.0 |
| Gelfand, Boris | ISR | 10.5 |
| Karjakin, Sergey | UKR | 10.0 |
| Gashimov, Vugar | AZE | 9.5 |
| Svidler, Peter | RUS | 9.0 |
| Aronian, Levon | ARM | 8.0 |
| Ponomariov, Ruslan | UKR | 7.5 |
| Smeets, Jan | NED | 4.0 |
| Dominguez Perez, Leinier | CUB | 4.0 |
Selected games from round nine are below. All games are available at the official website.
