Shirov emerges champion; Anand finishes fifth

By Arvind Aaron

Monte CARLO, MARCH 29. Alexei Shirov of Spain won the 9th Amber chess tournament, despite suffering a 0.5-1.5 defeat to Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine in the 11th and final round at the Le Metropole Palace Hotel here on Tuesday.

Shirov scored 15 points from his 22 games and won $26,500 in the rapid and blindfold events organised by Association of Max Euwe. In addition, Shirov also won the rapid section. The blindfold event was won by Vladimir Kramnik.

The second place was shared by Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria, Vladimir Kramnik of Russia and Vassily Ivanchuk of Ukraine on 13.5 points.

Viswanathan Anand drew both his final round games against Boris Gelfand of Israel to finish overall fifth. He finished second in blindfold with 7/11 and seventh in rapid section scoring 5.5/11.

The results (11th round):

Rapid: V. Anand drew with B. Gelfand, L. van Wely bt P. Nikolic, J. Lautier drew with J. Piket, A. Karpov drew with V. Kramnik, L. Ljubojevic bt V. Topalov, A. Shirov drew with V. Ivanchuk.

Blindfold: Gelfand drew with Anand, Nikolic lost to van Wely, Piket drew with Lautier, Kramnik drew with Karpov, Topalov drew with Ljubojevic, Ivanchuk bt Shirov.

lFinal placings: 1. A. Shirov (Esp) 15/22; 2-4 V. Ivanchuk (Ukr), V. Kramnik (Rus), V. Topalov (Bul) 13.5 each; 5. V. Anand (Ind) 12.5; 6. B. Gelfand (Isr) 12; 7-8 J. Piket (Ned), L. van Wely (Ned) 10.5 each; 9 A. Karpov (Rus) 10; 10. J. Lautier (Fra) 7.5; 11. L. Ljubojevic (Yug) 7; 12 P. Nikolic (Bih) 6.5.

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