World Chess Championship 2012

[David N. Snyder]

final position after Gelfand's move 38. Nxe6

[David N. Snyder]

Here is how it would have finished:

38. . . . e1/Q
39. Ng6+ Kg8
40. Rg7#

That is about as close to checkmate I have seen a championship game go in a long time (usually one resigns several moves before).

[David N. Snyder]

Actually, it is not a forced mate in two moves. There are still a few desperation moves to prolong the game; 38… Rh1+ 39. Kxh1 e1/R+ 40. Kh2 Rxe5 etc. (thanks to David2 over at Dhamma Wheel for pointing that out).

I was just looking for the reasonable moves. It is not a 'forced mate' in two moves, but of course still lost for Anand.

[mindyourmind]

He should have thrown in the towel after Ng6+ - or even earlier.

[David N. Snyder]

Game 8

17 MOVES!

Anand wins game 8 ! !



Anand bounces right back from yesterday's loss to tie the series back up.

I believe it is the shortest game in a title match.

[mindyourmind]

Even though I prefer those long trench-war endgames, this was beautiful.

[David N. Snyder]

Brilliant game! Perhaps one for the history books! Still too early to tell, but perhaps it might make one of the "Top 100 chess games of all-time".

I heard one of the commentators say that it appeared that black (Gelfand) might pull off two victories in a row after move number 10 and then Anand surprised everyone with that trap/trick.

What a way for Anand to redeem himself in this match.

[mindyourmind]

Brilliant game! Perhaps one for the history books! Still too early to tell, but perhaps it might make one of the "Top 100 chess games of all-time".

I heard one of the commentators say that it appeared that black (Gelfand) might pull off two victories in a row after move number 10 and then Anand surprised everyone with that trap/trick.

What a way for Anand to redeem himself in this match.

I hope Anand will forgive me if I say that before this game I would not have bet on him, if I was a betting man

I really must play more chess

[David N. Snyder]

A rest day today in the competition.

[David N. Snyder]

Game 9

49 moves!
Result: Draw
Time: 4 hours, 56 minutes

The longest game of the match, it was pretty good. White (Gelfand) had a queen and two pawns and Black (Anand) had a rook, knight, and three pawns.

Match score so far: 4.5 - 4.5

[David N. Snyder]

Game 10

25 moves
Draw

Match score so far: 5 - 5

Only two games left! And then it would go to extra, quick games.

[mindyourmind]

Fascinating stuff.

Who needs football.

Pity about those short games though. We should have chess championships like those old boxing matches- keep on swinging until only one person is left standing

[David N. Snyder]

Game 11

24 moves
Draw

Match score so far:
5.5 - 5.5

Only one game left!

There has been a high number of draws, which is common at this level, but even for a World Championship, this is high at 82% currently ending in draw.

[David N. Snyder]

Only about 18 hours left until the final game 12, unless it ends in a draw and then we go to the tie-break system.

[David N. Snyder]

Final Game 12
22 moves
Draw
Final score: 6-6

which means extra, quick games will be play May 30, 2012

4 'rapid' games of 25 minutes per player for the whole game, plus 10 seconds per move (each playing 2 games as white and 2 games as black)

If still tied, then it goes to blitz games!

[David N. Snyder]

The match is not over yet, tie-break fast games in two days. Here is a quick analysis of the 12 game match where there was standard time control:

1 win for Anand, 1 win for Gelfand
10 draws out of 12 games
83% of all games ending in a draw
d4, Nf6 opening used 5 times (Grunfeld, Nimzo-Indian)
d4, d5 opening used 4 times (Slav, Semi-slav)
e4, c5 opening used 3 times (Sicilian defence)

During one of the press conferences, Boris Gelfand was asked about an innovative move at move #5. His response was something like, "yes, that was very surprising; usually we are on book and don't make innovative moves until about move number 25 and sometimes not even until move number 40".

Looking at the first moves for Black and White, there are only 3 different variations in the entire match. Do we want a memory contest or a chess contest?

I think it is time for a variant, such as Fischer960 where there are 960 different possible starting positions or better yet my version,
D-Chess where there are over 8.2 million possible starting positions and only one game needs to be played.

[David N. Snyder]

Breaking News!

4 game tie-break complete!
3 draws, one win for Anand
Final score: 2.5-1.5

The decisive game was game number 2 of the tie-break where Anand won in 77 moves!

Vishy Anand wins the match!!!
Vishy Anand is still World Champion!!!

Congratulations to Vishy and Mother India!!!

[Nosta]

Great!

Well, i would be happy in either way lol.

I am portuguese, home of Cristiano Ronaldo, one of the best world soccer player, but even so i prefer chess. People dont give the same importance to chess and thats sad. We still prefer the gladiator style sports like soccer and we still prefer brainless & brute heroes like many soccer players.