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WIJK AAN ZEE, JANUARY 20: VISWANATHAN Anand settled an account
dating back to Corus Grandmasters chess tournament 2005, when
he outplayed Peter Leko in the fifth round to assume sole
lead at the 2006 edition. The revenge also put Anand in a
good position to win a record fifth title at Corus, which
by his admission is favourite tournament. Last year Leko beat
Anand to gain a decisive advantage in the race for the title.
Anand’s win gave him four points in five round and sole
possession of the lead. Meanwhile his arch-rival, Veselin
Topalov was unable to overcome the tenacious defense of Shakhriyar
Mamedyarov in an interesting fight and split the point. Vassily
Ivanchuk crushed Gata Kamsky to join Topalov in second place.
In group B, India’s Koneru Humpy drew with higher rated
Brazilian GM, Giovanni Vesconi and is now in sole seventh
place with three points. Arkadij Naiditsch shares the lead
with young Magnus Carlsen of Norway with four points from
five rounds.
Coming back to group A, Anand, supported by NIIT, said, “(There
were) Too many of my pieces fighting for the same squares,
but then came 16…Nb6?! Whereas 16…b5 was fine
for Leko.” After that white (Anand) found enough holes
to go through and the Hungarian simply drifted away from the
game, that opened with a Sicilian Najdorf.
Leko’s 16th move Nb6 and then 21… Nc4 left him
in a very a passive position that Anand is very good at attacking.
That’s what he did. Anand got some lovely spatial advantage
and also command of b3 and c4 squares and black is very passive.
By 26th move, Leko was structurally lost but he fought and
30. c5 was the collapsing point of Black’s position.
In the endgame with the far-advanced ‘d’ pawn
was a typical losing Gruenfeld-like ending, and the Indian
ace cashed in without problem.
Topalov tried extremely hard against Shakhriyar Mamedyarov
sacrificing the exchange for long term pressure. By the time
he'd got his final rook in play Mamedyarov was a rook for
bishop and three pawns down. However he found a nice combination
to draw the game shortly afterwards.
Sergey Karjakin defeated Etienne Bacrot in the second game
which was a closed Ruy Lopez. Vassily Ivanchuk inflicted another
defeat on Gata Kamsky. Kamsky, who
Meets Anand in sixth round has been in very poor form with
just one point in five games and is at the bottom of the table.
Pairings for Round 6: Sokolov v Leko; Kamsky v Anand; Adams
v Ivanchuk; Bacrot v Aronian; Van Wely v Karjakin; Mamedyarov
v Gelfand; Tiviakov v Topalov
Results of Round 5: Gelfand
drew with Van Wely; Karjakin beat Bacrot; Tiviakov drew with
Sokolov; Anand beat Leko; Ivanchuk beat Kamsky; Topalov drew
with Mamedyarov; Aronian drew with Adams
Standings after Round 5: 1.
Anand 4.0; 2. Ivanchuk and Topalov 3.5 each; 4. Gelfand and
Karjakin 3.0 each; 6. Adams, Mamedyarov and Aronian 2.5 each;
9. Leko, Sokolov, Van Wely and Tiviakov 2.0; 13. Bacrot 1.5;
14. Kamsky 1.0
Anand,V - Leko,P
Corus Wijk aan Zee (Round 5)
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be3 e5 7.Nf3
Be7 8.Bc4 0-0 9.0-0 Be6 10.Bb3 Nc6 11.Bg5 Nd7 12.Bxe7 Qxe7
13.Nd5 Qd8 14.c3 Na5 15.Re1 Rc8 16.h3 Nb6? 17.Nxb6 Qxb6 18.Bxe6
fxe6 19.Re2 Rc6 20.Qd3 Qc7 21.Rd1 Nc4 22.b3 Nb6 23.c4 Nc8
24.Red2 h6 25.Qe2 Kh7 26.h4 Qb6 27.h5 Qc5 28.Ne1 Rc7 29.Nd3
Qc6 30.c5 30...Ne7 31.Qg4 Rf6 32.b4 d5 33.Nxe5 Qa4 34.Qg3
Rc8 35.Ng4 Rf7 36.Qd6 Rcf8 37.Qxe6 Qxb4 38.exd5 Qxc5 39.d6
Nc6 40.d7 Its all over. 40...Nd8 41.Qe4+ Qf5 42.Re2 Qxe4 43.Rxe4
b5 44.f3 a5 45.Ne5 Rf6 46.Ng6 Rg8 47.Re8 Rf7 48.Rd5 b4 49.Ne7
1-0
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