The match ends as soon as a player scores 6.5 points. If, after 12 games, the score is equal, up to three rounds of tie breaks will be played. The first round will be four rapid games, with the players alternating white and black pieces. Time control for these games will be 25 minutes plus 10 seconds per move. If the score is still equal after the four rapid games, two blitz games will be played (5 minutes plus 10 seconds per move), each player having white once and black once. If the score is still equal after the two blitz games, a decisive Armageddon game will be played (6 minutes for white, 5 minutes for black, black declared champion in case of a draw).
The venue is the Art and Exhibition Hall in Bonn and the prize fund, which will be split equally between the players, is a cool $2.1 million.
Between 1989 and 2008 Anand and Kramnik played 51 head-to-head games with the Russian winning six and losing four to the Indian; the rest were drawn.
Asked in a recent interview how he was preparing for the match, Anand said, “I have been studying Kramnik since the end of April, up to 10 hours a day, here at home in my cellar, where I have my office. I have a database and construct game plans. I try to neutralize positions in which Kramnik is strong. He is doing the same thing with my game, which I must of course take into consideration. Let me put it this way: I must remember that he is thinking about what I am thinking about him. In any case one is working for months with the computer, trying to find new paths.”
Asked about the role of emotions in chess, Anand replied: “They are decisive. The moment in which you realize that you have made a mistake is the most unsettling you can imagine. You have to try to keep control of your emotions. Chess is a form of acting. If your opponent senses your insecurity or your annoyance or your dejection, then you are bolstering his courage. He will take advantage of your weakness. Confidence is very important — even pretending to be confident. If you make a mistake but do not let your opponent see what you are thinking then he may overlook the mistake.”
Is he good at reading the faces of your opponents?
“Usually their faces are completely calm and dispassionate,” Anand said. “The exception was Garry Kasparov, against whom I played a world championship in New York in 1995. He was an open book. What I tend to do is to listen to their breathing.”
When told there were rumors that the Norwegian wunderkind Magnus Carlsen would be one of his seconds for the match against Kramnik, Anand said: “That’s a rumor I have heard as well. Perhaps there is some truth in it. Perhaps not. Let Kramnik figure it out, let him occupy his mind with this question. That is part of the psychological game before this kind of match. When you know who is part of your opponent’s team you can imagine what he is planning. So I will not reveal anything.”
In a separate interview, Kramnik said his preparations started in November. “From that time I started to collect my team, I started to check the games of my opponent, to think about different possible strategies. But it became fairly intense from somewhere around April — more intense with more concrete chess work,” he said.
And unlike Anand, Kramnik revealed who would be on his team: Russian GM Sergey Rublevsky, French GM Laurent Fressinet and Hungarian GM Peter Leko, who drew a match with the then-classical world champ four years ago.
Asked why he didn’t “hide” his seconds, Kramnik replied: “Why should I?”
The living chess legend who lost his crown to Kramnik in 2000 was asked to give a prediction: “It’s hard to predict,” Kasparov said. “I would think Kramnik is a slight favorite in this match, because he is more stable as a match player.… I don’t know whether Anand can quickly recover after his disastrous performance. Kramnik doesn’t care, he can play a poor event and then he sheds it off. Anand might be more sensitive. There’s not a real favorite, it’s not Obama-McCain, Anand-Kramnik is much closer, maybe 52-48 within these numbers.”
Game of the week. Here is the defending world champ in a game that was ranked the best of Informant Volume 101. Anand himself annotates this gem.
According to the Informant, “Anand, as black in a very popular variation of Semi-Slav Defense, played the very strong novelty 17…c5! It came as such a surprise to Aronian that he followed up with the unnecessary 19.Kh1?! and the weak 21.Nd5? Anand began a strong counter-attack with the excellent 22…Be5! and kept an initiative until the end of the game.”
White: L. Aronian (2750)
Black: V.Anand (2792)
Queen’s Gambit Declined
Semi-Slav
Mexico City 2007
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 c6 5.Bg5 h6 6.Bh4 dc4 7.e4 g5 8.Bg3 b5 9.Ne5 h5 10.h4 g4 11.Be2 Bb7 12.0-0 Nbd7 13.Qc2 Ne5 14.Be5 Bg7 15.Rad1 0-0 16.Bg3 Nd7 17.f3 c5! [a novelty] 18.dc5 [18.Nb5 cd4 19.Nd4? Qb6 20.Bf2 g3! 21.Be3 Qd8 with the idea 22.Bg5? Bd4 23.Rd4 Qb6 and Black is winning; 18.d5 Be5 19.f4 Bd4 weak point Be2] Qe7 19.Kh1?! [19.Bd6 Qh4 20.g3 Qh3 21.Rf2 Ne5!; 19.Rd6 a6! 20.c6 Bc6 21.Rc6 Ne5 22.Rb6 Qa7 23.Bf2 g3 24.Be3 Qe7! and Black is superior; 19.fg4 Qc5 20.Bf2 Qc6 21.gh5 Ne5 with compensation; 19.Rf2!?] a6 20.a4 Bc6 21.Nd5? [21.Rd6 Be5 22.Rd7 Bd7 23.Be5 Qh4 24.Kg1 g3 and Black is superior; 21.ab5 ab5 22.Nd5 ed5 23.ed5 Be5 24.f4 Bg7 25.dc6 Nc5 26.Rd5 Ra2; 25…Nf6; 21.fg4! hg4 22.Nd5 ed5 23.ed5 Nc5 (23…Be5? 24.Rf5!) 24.dc6 Ne4] ed5 22.ed5 22…Be5! 23.f4 Bg7 24.dc6 [24.Rfe1 Qc5 (24…Nc5 25.Bc4) 25.dc6 Qc6 a) 26.Bd3 Nc5 27.Bh7 Kh8 28.ab5 ab5 29.Qf5 Na4 (29…Nd3? 30.Qh5) 30.Qh5 Qh6 31.Qh6 Bh6 32.Be4 Nb2 33.Rd6 Bg7 34.Ba8 Ra8; b) 26.b3 Nc5 27.ab5 ab5 28.bc4 Ne4 (28…b4 29.Rd5 b3 30.Qf5) 29.Kh2 Ng3 30.Kg3 Ra3 and Black is superior] Nc5 [24…Nf6 25.f5 Qc5 26.Bd6 Qc6 27.Bf8 Rf8] 25.Rd5 Ne4 26.Be1 Qe6 27.Rh5 [27.ab5 Qd5 28.Bc4 Qd4 29.b6 (29.Bd3; 29.ba6 Rfe8 30.b3 g3 and Black is winning) Nd6 and Black is winning] f5! [weak point Rh5; 27…Qg6 28.f5 Qh5 29.Qe4] 28.Kh2 Rac8 29.Bb4 Rfe8 30.ab5 ab5 31.Re1 Qf7 32.Rg5 Ng5 33.fg5 [33.hg5 Qh5 (33…Bd4 34.Bf1 Be3 and Black is winning) 34.Kg3 Re3 35.Kf2 Bd4?? 36.Bc4!; 35…Re4! and Black is winning] Rc6 [33…Re3? 34.Bc4!] 34.Bf1 [34.Rf1 Rce6 35.Bd1 Qc7 36.g3 Re3 and Black is winning] Re1 35.Be1 Re6 36.Bc3 Qc7 37.g3 Re3 38.Qg2 [38.Qf2 f4] Bc3 39.bc3 f4 40.Qa8 Kg7 41.Qa6 fg3 [42.Kg1 Qf7 43.Qh6 Kg8] 0-1
Puzzler.
White — pawns on b3, b4, h2; Qa8, Ke1, Be4, Ne7
Black — pawns on a5, b5, e5, g5; Na7, Bb6, Ke3
White to play and mate in three moves.
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