Khalifman in final

The fighter from Romania, sporting a blue sweat shirt tried a desperate sacrifice of a piece to get rid of the menacing pawns. However, Khalifman gave the piece back for an attack on the black king with his position slipping slowly but surely, Nisipeanu came up with a queen offer. By exhibiting remarkable technique, Khalifman forced the Romanian to surrender on 42nd move.

In the second game, Khalifman apparently ran into Nisipeanu’s home analysis. The game followed Nisipeanu’s earlier game against GM Alexander Khasin played at Kochalin. Khalifman missed 20th move played by Khasin then and got into difficulties. Suddenly the Romanian was in the driver’sseat.

Khalifman gave a pawn to confuse Nisipeanu. Now it was the Romanian’s turn to fumble under pressure after surviving 20 days of intense chess. He missed wins on 36th and 39th move. Khalifman was short of time too. He played a weak move on his 41st turn. There was a deafening silence in the hall.

Whether Nisipeanu would play the pawn push tieing the match once again was a question on everybody’s mind. But the Romanian was too exhausted to take the chance. He could only draw the game after 59 moves and bowled out of the race. It was the end of a terrific performance from a player who was not in the top 100 of the Fide list. Nisipeanu defeated World No 15 Azmaiparashvilly before knocking out the top tens — Ivanchuk and Shirov.

He would have been the youngest champion had he won the World Championship here. “He is playing the chess for next millenium,” admired his conqueror Alexander Khalifman.