World rapid chess champion Viswanathan Anand stretched his lead to a whopping three points over Russian Grandmaster Alexander Grischuk adding 1.5 points from the third and fourth games of the Grenke Leasing Chess Classic of Mainz.
With 3.5 points in his kitty from just four games, Anand has almost assured himself of a fifth straight victory in the lovely German town of Mainz as he now requires just one point out of four in the eight-game match.
After winning the first two games, the Indian ace got a bit lucky in next two drawing the third with white quite early while winning the fourth game from a difficult position.
Anand did not quite find his magical touch on day two. In the third game, the Indian faced stiff resistance from Grischuk who had come well-armed against the English attack. The moves were same as the second game for quite some time but Grischuk had a better plan up his sleeves to counter the white pieces.
Anand sensed some trouble in the middle game when Grischuk went for a piece sacrifice and opted for a safer approach leading to a balanced endgame. The draw was agreed in just 24 moves.
The fourth game was simply a disaster for the Russian, who apparently had a huge advantage that he did not convert. Playing the white side of a Queen's Indian, Grischuk did everything right to tighten the noose in the middle game with emphatic manoeuvring but just fumbled under time pressure to let the game slip from his grasp.
It was in the middle game that Grischuk uncorked a fine attacking plan and got his rook to penetrate into the heart of black's position but when the opportunity presented itself, the Russian crumbled once more, failing to find the right path to further strengthen his position. Once on top Anand, had little trouble romping home in 42 moves.
"He conducted the attack quite well and I had an unpleasant position despite the extra pawn. Alexander just played better than me today," Anand said in the post game conference.
Asked about his big lead at the half way stage Anand added, "It is a great cushion but it is better not to think about it".
Grischuk was quite annoyed with the way things have gone thus far.
"The press will write that Vishy [Anand] was lucky, but I don't deserve any better with the level of my play."
Meanwhile, Levon Aronian of Armenia was the worthy winner of the Finet Chess 960 open tournament scoring 10 points out of a possible 11.
World Junior champion P Harikrishna had to be content with 32nd place with 7 points to his credit.
In Chess 960, earlier called the Fischer random chess, the initial position of the pieces is randomly changed at the start of the game.
In the Chess 960 World Championship match between Russian Peter Svidler and Hungarian Zoltan Almasi, the former kept his full point lead drawing both the games on the second day. The score stands at 2.5-1.5 in favour of Svidler at this stage.
The moves:
Game 3: V Anand v/s A Grischuk
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. f3 Qb6 7. Nb3 e6 8. Bf4 Qc7 9. Qd2 Nc6 10. O-O-O Ne5 11. Nd4 Be7 12. g4 O-O 13. h4 b5 14. h5 b4 15. Nb1 Nexg4 16. Bg3 Qc5 17. h6 g6 18. Nb3 Qe3 19. Bxd6 Rd8 20. Bxe7 Rxd2 21. N1xd2 Nf2 22. Bc5 Nxd1 23. Bxe3 Nxe3 24. Na5 Kf8 draw agreed.
Game 4: A Grischuk v/s V Anand
1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nf3 b6 4. Nc3 Bb7 5. a3 d5 6. cxd5 Nxd5 7. e3 g6 8. Bd3 Bg7 9. Nxd5 exd5 10. b4 Nd7 11. O-O O-O 12. a4 c6 13. a5 b5 14. a6 Bc8 15. Qc2 Qb6 16. e4 Bxa6 17. e5 Bb7 18. h4 Rfe8 19. h5 Nf8 20. Ra5 Ne6 21. Be3 a6 22. Qd2 Rf8 23. Bb1 Qd8 24. g3 f5 25. Ng5 Re8 26. Kg2 Bc8 27. Rh1 Ra7 28. f3 Bf8 29. hxg6 hxg6 30. Ra1 Qe7 31. Rh7 Bg7 32. Bc2 a5 33. bxa5 c5 34. dxc5 d4 35. Bf4 Nxg5 36. Bxg5 Qxc5 37. Rah1 Qxe5 38. Bd3 Bb7 39. Bf4 Qd5 40. Be2 Rxa5 41. Rxg7+ Kxg7 42. Bh6+ Kf7 white resigned.
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