Journalism of Courage
To start with,here are the numbers. Magnus Carlsen has been the World No. 1 for more than a year and is rated 2870,just two points off the highest-ever rating,which he hit a few months ago. Viswanathan Anand is 95 rating points and seven spots behind on the ranking list. Anand will turn 44 in a month8217;s time and Carlsen,at 22,will become the youngest-ever world champion if he wins the match in Chennai,equalling Garry Kasparovs record. Though Anand had the better of their early exchanges and leads the head-to-head 6-3,all his wins came when Carlsen was still in his teens. In fact,the momentum has swung Carlsen8217;s way in the last couple of years. The Norwegian has won all three of their most recent decisive games,the last of which saw him crush Anand in 29 moves. Anand described the loss as humiliating.
Still,even the most extreme of opinionators will not venture that Anand can do nothing to stop Carlsen from dethroning him in the 12-round World Championship match starting on Saturday. Likewise,even the most ardent Anand fans will agree that Carlsen starts as favourite.
Surprise element
Though there could be several factors that may swing things Anand8217;s way,the most decisive of them will be the champion8217;s choice of opening with white. To see why that is so,we need to go back to a time when Anand was not even the World Champion. In the Classical World Championship of 2000,Garry Kasparov,then ranked World No. 1,was shocked by his one-time second Vladimir Kramnik,who was rated 76 points below him. Playing black,Kramnik employed the virtually impenetrable Berlin defense in response to 1. e4,the king pawn opening to blunt the greatest player of all time. Kramnik nicked two wins with white,and went undefeated through 15 games to pull off a huge upset. Until this point,players had no doubt prepared hard for title bouts,but never had the surprise factor been employed so effectively. It would be eight years before something similar happened in a championship match. When it did,the boot was on the other foot.
Going into the 2008 World Championship game,Anand was the defending champion,but Kramnik was considered the favourite. A 1. e4 player until then,Anand surprised Kramnik with 1. d4 queen pawn opening,a strategy that helped him stay away from Kramnik8217;s Berlin 8216;wall8217; and Petroff notoriously drawish responses to 1. e4,and the Russian was an exponent of both. What was more,Anand ambushed Kramnik with his home preparation in the Semi-Slav Defense with black. Most of the decisive games were won or lost right out of the opening and it was Anand who held all the aces. He retained the world title he had won the previous year,beating Kramnik with a game to spare. Anand would go on to defend his title against Veselin Topalov 2010 and Boris Gelfand 2012 using a similar approach,and remain the World Champion for six years.
A novelty,by definition,does not age well and Anand8217;s opening preparation,which hit Kramnik out of the blue,was becoming fairly predictable by the time the Gelfand game came along. In fact,while Anand stuck to 1. d4,Gelfand surprised him with the Grunfeld,a defense the Indian had assumed the challenger did not have in his repertoire. It was by the skin of his teeth in the rapid tie-breaks,after the classical games had ended 6-6 that Anand got through.
Back to old favourite?
Now,little more than a year later,against an opponent who might hold the edge in other departments,Anand will once again have to rely on guile,deception and preparation in the opening area.
8220;Anand is somewhat caught in the middle now. He has shifted from 1. e4 to 1. d4 but that may not work against Carlsen. He has tons of experience playing 1. e4 at the top level. He will be more comfortable and natural in such positions. I feel he may go back to 1. e4 this match and that will be his real style,which has a lot of risks,calculated attacks,tactics and energetic play,8221; says GM RB Ramesh.
The other reason Ramesh feels Anand ought to go back to 1. e4 is because Carlsen is unlikely to employ the Berlin or the Petroff. 8220;A player8217;s personality comes through in his games and I feel Carlsen will not go for the Berlin or the Petroff. It is not his style. He does not play for a draw,with white or black,8221; he says.
Peter Doggers,who runs the popular website chessvibes.com,suggests that Anand might benefit from playing 1. e4,considering the difference in the styles of the players. Anand is at his best in dynamic,sharp positions where both sides have several ideas to work with,while Carlsen grinds wins out of positions that appear draw-ish or hold only a notional advantage for him by playing accurately and keeping his opponent under pressure. Carlsen,more often than not,is ready to get out of the opening with a slight disadvantage as long as the position is still playable and proceeds to turn it around. This suggests that Anand should play openings that would make Carlsen pay the most for deviating from theory. The sharp lines of 1. e4,according to Doggers,could give Anand an advantage.
1. d4 has more solid positional principles where the positions are less chaotic,less sharp and dangerous for white,and black has several solid defences 8230; 1. e4 has been the classical move which was almost always played in the 19th century. Back then it led to many romantic openings,where you could sacrifice pawns. Basically it is an aggressive idea,to develop quickly,leading to sharp and maybe attacking positions 8230; if you take into account Carlsen8217;s approach to get out of opening theory as quickly as possible,1. e4 is a strong idea because it is dangerous to step out of theoretical lines,8221; he says.
While this may in theory present Anand with a good chance,Doggers suggests he may even have to try the relatively unexplored 1. c4 English opening at some point during the match. 8220;Now 1. c4,it is even less theoretical than 1. d4 and you have space for finding something creative. My prediction is we will see 1.c4 more than once in the match. Ideally,Anand should find something in all three and use them depending on match situations,8221; he says. Anand,in effect,will have to show a level of unprecedented expertise in almost all choices of openings. It may be asking for the impossible,but that is pretty much what will be asked of Anand over the next 12 games.
Live amp; kicking: Where to follow Anand vs Carlsen
The official website chennai2013.fide.com will stream the game live,with GM Susan Polgar,GM RB Ramesh,IM Tania Sachdev and IM Lawrence Trent providing the commentary.
DD Sports,the official broadcaster,will perhaps be the only television channel to broadcast the whole event live. The telecast for today8217;s game will begin at 3 pm.
A few useful twitter handles to follow for updates during the games are FWCM2013,and commentators SusanPolgar and LawrenceTrentIM. Quotes from the conferences after the game will be tweeted by NastiaKarlovich. Of course,Chessvibes and Chessbase,two of the sport8217;s popular news sites,will also be active during the match.
A few sites such as chessbomb.com allow users to follow the game with the help of engine analysis and predictions.
Most good things in life do not come free,and the coverage of the WCC game online is no different. Daniel King,along with Simon Williams,will provide in-depth coverage of the games at playchess.com,while chess.com has a long list of GMs and IMs who will be commenting for the site through the match.
