Tags:
Journalism of Courage
MADRID, May 13: Grandmaster Viswanathan Anand scored a facile win over Michael Krasenkov of Poland in the second round to become the sole leader with two points at the 7th Torneo Magistral Madrid Open Chess here last night.
Anand recorded his second straight win in the tournament with a 49-move crushing of Krasenkov and ensured a half-point point lead over rest of the players.
The World number two Anand8217;s remarkable two opening games in this category-17 round robin tournament has raised his hopes of crossing the elusive 2800 Elo mark when the next ratings are released in June.
The Indian needs to collect seven points from nine rounds in this 10-player tournament to reach the coveted 2800 mark, only achieved by chess wizard and unofficial world champion Gary Kasparov of Russia. Seven more rounds to go in the tournament and the top seed Anand is favourite to achieve the goal.A little known Spanish GM, Pablo San Segundo, a veteran of all seven editions here, recorded the biggest upset of the day when heshocked Alex Yermolinsky of the United States.
Yermolinsky, overnight joint-leader with Anand suffered the blow in a game filled with exchange sacrifices 8211; the Spanish making a deadly sacrifice in the endgame to close the battle in 27 moves.
The tournament favourite Anand kept fighting all the way against an opponent with whom he played for the first time. He kept his cool in the middlegame and pounced back using the opportunity he got in Krasenkov8217;s time pressure. Playing white for the second straight time here, Anand opened with his king knight and the game changed into a system of the English opening.
The Polish Krasenkov was very slow in making his first move and remained behind the clock throughout and he could never recover the time.
As the playing speed stopped, Anand made a tactical move by exchanging queens thus stopping Krasenkov from castling. However, the Polish GM put himself in a little better position, Anand having less scope of attacking with his pieces on the queen sideweak.
Krasenkov tried to shake-off the time pressure, won a pawn on the 17th move but it did not serve the purpose as Anand fought back to surprise the Polish as the black king found itself surrounded by white bishop pair and a rook.Krasenkov committed a serious blunder on the 24th move which changed the character of the game as Anand gained equality. By this time, Krasenkov found himself in deep time trouble 8211; he had four minutes and 13 moves to make. But with equality on the board, Krasenkov failed to translate it into his favour and made another serious blunder on the 38th move in the dying seconds of the first time control, which sealed the game in Indians8217; favour.
MOVES
Anand-Krasenkov: 1. Nf3 nf6 2. C4 c5 3. Nc3 nc6 4. G3 d5 5. D4 E6 6. Cxd5 nxd5 7. Bg2 cxd4 8. Nxd4 ndb4 9. Ndb5 a6 10. Qxd8 kxd8 11. Na3 e5 12. 0-0 be6 13. Be3 kc7 14. B3 rc8 15. Rfc1 kb8 16. Nc4 nd4 17. Rab1 bxc4 18. Bxc4 rxc4 19. Bd2 b5 20. Kf1 be7 21. Rd1 rd8 22. A4 ndc2. 23. Axb5 rcd4 24. Ne4 f5 25. E3 r4d5 26. Bxa6 fxe427. Ke2 na3 28. Ra1 nbc2 29. Rac1 bb4 30. Bxd4 nxb4 31. Rxd5 nxd5 32. Bxe4 nb5 33. Bxh7 ndc3 34. Kf1 ka7 35. Ra1 rd6 36. Kg2 rxa6 37. Rc1 rc6 38. Bd3 rc7 39. Bxb5 nxb5 40. Rxc7 nxc7 41. Kf3 ne6 42. Ke4 ng5 43. Kf5 nh3 44. F4 1-0. Black resigned.
