Anand sails into quarterfinals

By Rakesh Rao

NEW DELHI, DEC. 7. Raising expectations is easier than living up to them. But somehow, Viswanathan Anand seems to possess an uncanny knack of making it all look so easy, so simple.

In another delightful continuation of his winning sequence with white pieces, the top seed demolished Bartlomeij Macieja to set up the much-awaited clash with defending champion Alexander Khalifman in the quarterfinals that opens on Saturday.

If Anand was the first winner of the day, 26th seed Vladislav Tkachiev knocked out second seeded Alexander Morozevich to pull off the biggest upset of the championship late in the evening.

A little earlier, Khalifman outplayed Brazilian Rafael Leitao in the prolonged rook-and-pawn ending to move up. But the man who needed to win and eventually won was Veselin Topalov. The Bulgarian avenged the loss suffered at the hands of Alexey Dreev on Wednesday and forced the tie-breaker.

Others matches on Friday will be Michael Adams versus Peter Svidler, Jaan Ehlvest versus Alexander Grischuk, Alexei Shirov versus Boris Gelfand and Evegeny Bareev. All these encounters ended in a draw for the second successive day.

Coming back to Anand's 35-move victory, the verdict was made easier once Macieja faltered on the 23rd turn. In Anand's opinion, the rook-move was a blunder. ``Black looked solid for a while and it could have been a very long game. Had he not blundered, I was comfortable with two bishops and a queenside majority. But once he blundered, I could sacrifice (a bishop for four pawns) and win. Even after the sacrifice, white could not lose,'' Anand was to say later.

Once Anand got the opportunity to trade his bishop for four pawns to leave Macieja's king embarrassingly exposed. After cleaning up the pawns with his queen, Anand prepared to bring his rook into action. Macieja overlooked another rook move in the end and did not continue as checkmate was inevitable.

Anand, after a day's rest, faces Khalifman who has kept his sense of humour intact despite another hard-fought battle. After clearing two hurdles via tie-breaker, Khalifman accomplished the job expected of him in the classical games itself.

``I was tired after playing the long tie-breaker (against Peter Leko) and am happy to get a day's rest,'' said the champion. On meeting Anand next, Khalifman said, ``I don't have a good record against Anand. Even against Leko I did not have a good record but I won here. Anand is well-prepared and is playing very well. Even with black pieces, he is not giving his opponents any chance. But, I will do my best.''

It may be recalled that Anand has a 3.5-0.5 record against Khalifman. But in their previous World championship match in 1997, Anand had prevailed after fighting from inferior positions both in the classical and rapid games, in the first round.

Reeling from Wednesday's drubbing, Topalov had to come up with an aggressive plan to ensure that he survived to fight another day. Since a draw today meant a place in the last-eight stage for Dreev, Topalov could not afford to get into a positional battle. But then, he did not have to work very hard once Dreev gave a queen-check on the 21st move and everything began to go wrong. Topalov went on to win a rook on the 24th move, sacrificed a rook for bishop on the 31st, and won three moves later.

lThe results (pre-quarterfinals: game two): Viswanthan Anand (Ind, 2762) 1.5 bt Bartlomiej Macieja (Pol, 2536) 0.5; Alexander Khalifman (Rus, 2667) 1.5 bt Rafael Leitao (Bra, 2567); Michael Adams (Eng, 2755) 1 drew with Peter Svidler (Rus, 2689) 1; Veselin Topalov (Bul, 2707) 1 bt Alexey Dreev (Rus, 2676) 1; Vladislav Tkachiev (Fra, 2657) 1.5 bt Alexander Morozevich (Rus, 2756) 0.5; Alexander Grischuk (Rus, 2606) 1 drew with Jaan Ehlvest (2627) 1; Boris Gelfand (Isr, 2681) 1 drew with Alexei Shirov (Esp, 2746) 1; Boris Gulko (USA, 2643) 1 drew with Evgeny Bareev (Rus, 2702) 1.

lThe moves: Viswanathan Anand (India, white); Bartlomiej Macieja (Poland): 1. e4 c6, 2. d4 d5, 3. Nc3 dxe4, 4. Nxe4 Nd7, 5. Bc4 Ngf6, 6. Ng5 e6 7. Qe2 Nb6, 8. Bb3 h6, 9. N5f3 a5, 10. a4 c5, 11. Bf4 Nd6, 12. Ne5 0-0, 13. Ngf3 Nbd5, 14. Bg3 Qc7, 15. dxc5 Qxc5, 16. 0-0 b6, 17. Rfd1 Ba6, 18. c4 Rad8, 19. Nd4 Bxe5, 20. Bxe5 Nb4, 21. Nb5 Bxb5, 22. cxb5 Rxd1+, 23. Rxd1 Rc8, 24. Bxf6 gxf6, 25. Bxe6 fxe6, 26. Qxe6+ Kh8 27. Qxf6 Kg8, 28. Qe6+ Kh8, 29. Qxh6 Kg8, 30. Qe6+ Kh8, 31. h3 Rf8, 32. Qh6+ Kg8, 33. Qg6+ Kh8, 34. Qg3 Qc2, 35. Rd4 1-0.

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