Thursday, Apr 04, 2002
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Chess
By Our Chess Correspondent
After making a comfortable draw, even missing a slight winning chance in her white game, Zhu Chen, 25, overcame the sloppy play of Ponomariov with the black pieces for a historic win over the reigning World champion. Meanwhile, Viswanathan Anand defeated Taleb Moussa of the United Arab Emirates after surviving some anxious moments. Anand played the Rossolimo attack with the white pieces against Sicilian Defence. White's advantage was marginal, and with both sides fully developed, black broke through on the 22nd move with his pawn. White was thought to be in trouble after the 32nd move, but then the time factor played its part. After that it was a series of blunder from Moussa, with the final blunder coming on move 37 and he had to resign after white's 38th move as Anand was winning one of two rooks with his bishop. Earlier, after drawing the first game, Ponomariov built a space advantage with the white pieces in a Sicilian Najdorf opening. On the 23rd turn he moved his queen to attack a pawn but overlooked a counterattack and lost a pawn. Sensing elimination, Ponomariov played very aggressively thereafter and every effort of his was countered by the Chinese girl. The rash pawn advance starting move 30 only added to white's weakness as a comfortable draw by waiting was possible. Unwilling to go into the play off, Ponomariov tried to turn the tide, but failed. His 40th move resulted in black enjoying a passed pawn in the middle of the board. Ponomariov's blunder on move 50 was catastrophic and Zhu Chen won a bishop and soon the game on the 61st turn. In the first game too, Ponomariov was made to sweat for a draw in a King's Indian defence opening game with the black pieces. Zhu Chen advanced his queen rook pawn and promoted a brand new queen to win a rook for bishop advantage. However, Ponomariov's technique was perfect in the endgame as he drew a lone bishop against white's rook and king rook pawn in a long marathon duel. The other wildcard entrant, 1990 born International Master, Sergey Kariakin of Ukraine was shown the exit by the experienced Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria. Kariakin who shocked experts with a dazzling array of exhibition blitz games at the World Championship final closing ceremony in Moscow by beating Zurab Azmaiparashvili and drawing Vassily Ivanchuk bowed out after a 0-2 defeat. Former world champion Anatoly Karpov, the evergreen 50-year-old Russian came from behind to defeat Loek van Wely of the Netherlands 2.5-1.5 after a long tie-break session. Losing the first rapid game with white after being puzzled by an offbeat opening line, Karpov bounced back to win the second game and force the blitz play off. Here, in the first one, he won a long 83-move bishop ending using all his experience and then drew the black game for a hard earned round two entry. The results: Round One: Zhu Chen (Chn) bt Ruslan Ponomariov (Ukr) 1.5-0.5; Veselin Topalov (Bul) bt Sergey Kariakin (Ukr) 2-0; Kiril Georgiev (Bul) bt Predrag Nikolic (Bih) 1.5-0.5; Alexey Dreev (Rus) bt Ye Jiangchuan (Chn) 2-0; Joel Lautier (Fra) bt Maxim Novik (Rus) 1.5-0.5; Loek van Wely (Ned) lost to Anatoly Karpov (Rus) 1.5-2.5; Viswanathan Anand leads Taleb Moussa (UAE) 1-0.
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