The Hindu : Sport / Chess : Kasimdzhanov to meet Adams in final

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Jul 07, 2004

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Sport - Chess

Kasimdzhanov to meet Adams in final

TRIPOLI, JULY 6. Top-seeded Grandmaster Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria made his exit from the World chess championship after a second straight defeat against GM Rustam Kasimdzhanov of Uzbekistan in the semifinal tiebreaker here. In the final round, Kasimdzhanov will meet GM Michael Adams of England, who had ousted another Uzbek GM Teimour Radjabov in the semifinals.

For Kasimdzhanov this event has been an exceptional one with victories over top seeds including No. 3 Alexander Grishchuk of Russia and No. 4 Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine.

Only five players with over 2700 Elo rating participated in this World championship and three of them were knocked out by Kasimdzhanov. Adams is the only one remaining from the club, while the fifth, Nigel Short of England, was knocked out as early as in the second round by Michal Krasenkow of Poland.

Topalov tried whatever he could but Kasimdzhanov simply did not budge in the second tie-breaker game. Up against a side variation against Sicilian, the Bulgarian got the complexities in the middle game he was hoping for but allowed white to get a vice-like grip after opting for an erroneous plan.

Kasimdzhanov finished the game in style, knocking down as many as three pawns before Topalov extended his congratulatory hand on the 42nd move. — PTI

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