The youngest player to cross the 2800 mark and top the world rankings, Magnus is five points ahead of number two, former FIDE champ Veselin Topalov, and 20 points above world champion Viswanathan Anand. Former world champ Vladimir Kramnik is now number four.
Anand, Topalov and Kramnik have been the world’s strongest GMs since Kasparov retired in Oct. 2005. But the new kid’s in town now, and he only happens to be a student of Kasparov himself.
Here’s the list of FIDE’s top 20:
1 Carlsen, Magnus g NOR 2810
2 Topalov, Veselin g BUL 2805
3 Anand, Viswanathan g IND 2790
4 Kramnik, Vladimir g RUS 2788
5 Aronian, Levon g ARM 2781
6 Gelfand, Boris g ISR 2761
7 Gashimov, Vugar g AZE 2759
8 Ivanchuk, Vassily g UKR 2749
9 Wang, Yue g CHN 2749
10 Svidler, Peter g RUS 2744
11 Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar g AZE 2741
12 Leko, Peter g HUN 2739
13 Ponomariov, Ruslan g UKR 2737
14 Eljanov, Pavel g UKR 2736
15 Grischuk, Alexander g RUS 2736
16 Radjabov, Teimour g AZE 2733
17 Morozevich, Alexander g RUS 2732
18 Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime g FRA 2730
19 Jakovenko, Dmitry g RUS 2730
20 Shirov, Alexei g ESP 2723
Game of the week. Magnus topped the recently held London tournament, from which our featured “partie” is taken. It is only fitting that it was played by two other up and coming young GMs: England’s Luke McShane, who turned 25 yesterday, and U.S. champ Hikaru Nakamura, 22.
Their game was adjudged as the tournament’s best and received the prize of 10,000 euros, or over $14,000!
According to our annotator, IM Malcolm Pein, “the game featured a novelty in the opening, a King’s Indian Defense, a sacrifice of the exchange and then some very difficult middlegame play in an obscure position. As McShane said afterward, he wasn’t walking a fine line between a win and a draw, had he made a single inaccuracy in the endgame where he held bishop against rook, he could have lost.”
White: H. Nakamura (2715)
Black: L McShane (2615)
London Chess Classic 2009
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.Be2 0-0 6.Nf3 e5 7.0-0 Na6 8.Be3 Ng4 9.Bg5 Qe8 10.c5 exd4 11.Nd5 (There are seven sensible moves here. Black takes the sensible course of playing the one that is hardly known to avoid preparation) 11…Be6 (11…Qxe4; 11…dxc5; 11…h6; 11…Nxc5 McShane had played and lost with this 12.Nxc7 Qxe4 13.Re1 Rb8 14.Bc4 Qf5 15.Be7 Navara – McShane 2007; 11…c6; 11…f6) 12.Be7 Bxd5 13.Bxf8 Qxf8 14.exd5 dxc5 (14…Nxc5 15.Nxd4) 15.Qb3 Rb8 16.Rfe1 Qd6 17.h3 Nf6 18.Bxa6 (18.a3 b5 19.Bxb5 c6 20.dxc6 Nc7 21.a4 a6 was considered by McShane and is pretty random) 18…Qxa6 19.Rac1 Bf8 20.Ne5 Qb6 21.Qf3 (21.d6 Qxb3 22.dxc7 Rc8 23.axb3=) 21…Qd6 22.g4 (The rooks have no entry points. Black is threatening to take on d5, consolidate and advance) 22…Bh6 23.Rc2 Re8 24.Rce2 Rf8 25.Nc4 Qxd5!! 26.Qxf6 Bg7! (A nice intermezzo) 27.Qh4 Qxc4 28.Re8 Qd5 29.Rxf8+ (29.Qe7 d3) 29…Bxf8 30.Re8 Kg7 31.g5 Qd6 32.Kf1 b5 33.Ke1 c4 34.Qe4 c5 35.h4 c3 36.bxc3 dxc3 37.Qe5+ Qxe5+ 38.Rxe5 a5 39.Kd1 a4 40.a3 b4 41.Kc2 h6! 42.Rd5? (Looks like the fatal error 42.Re8 hxg5 43.hxg5 Bd6 44.Ra8 b3+ 45.Kxc3 Be5+ 46.Kd2 c4 47.Rxa4 c3+ 48.Kc1 Bd6 49.Kb1 c2+ 50.Kb2 Be5+ 51.Kc1 Bd6 52.Kb2=) 42…hxg5 43.hxg5 Kh7! 44.Rd7 Bg7 45.Rxf7 b3+ 46.Kb1 Kg8 47.Ra7 Bd4 48.Rxa4 Kf7 49.Ra6 Be5 50.Ra4 (50.Rc6 c2+ 51.Kc1 Bf4+) 50…Ke6 51.Rh4 Kd5 52.a4 c4 53.Rh1 c2+ 54.Kc1 c3 55.Rh4 Bd6 and 0-1.
Puzzler.
White — Ka4, Ba6, Nb8, Nc6, Qc1, pawns on e3 and h4
Black — Kd5, Nd6, Rf7, Bh7, Rh3, pawns on b3, c4, c7, d4, e6 and f3
White to play and mate in four.
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