Anand Vs Carlsen | Who will be the new king?
Viswanathan Anand is the underdog against Magnus Carlsen in a battle of ages, experience and playing styles
Aniek Paul
Experts and bookmakers have written off Viswanathan Anand, the reigning world chess champion for the past six years, even before his 12-game match against Magnus Carlsen, the world’s highest rated player, has begun.
The reason: Anand at 43, according to some experts, is past his prime, whereas Carlsen, who turns 23 at the end of this month, has been scaling new heights since 2010. Game one of the Fide (World Chess Federation) World Championship match starts in Chennai on Saturday.
Considering his strength, it is surprising that Carlsen hasn’t yet won the world title. That is partly because he sat out the 2012 World Championship in protest against its format, which he thought favoured the reigning champion.
He was in great form in 2012, won three high-level tournaments and pushed his rating—a measure of a player’s strength—to a record high. By the end of the year, Anand slipped on world rankings despite defending his world title. For two years till the middle of 2011, Anand and Carlsen played catch up with each other for the top position on the rating list, but since then the Norwegian has surged ahead.
Carlsen has only his own records to break, going forward. Rated 2,870, he is ahead of the No.2 in world rankings, Armenia’s Levon Aronian, by 69 points, and Anand, ranked eighth, by 95 points.
Going by statistics, Carlsen is already the strongest chess player the world has ever seen. He says he is still enjoying the game, which means he will rule the world of chess for many more years. Welcome to what former world champion Garry Kasparov had predicted as the “Carlsen era” of chess.
This match is being billed by commentators as the most anticipated after the Bobby Fischer–Boris Spassky gladiatorial duel of 1972 at the height of the Cold War. Why?
Anand is undoubtedly the underdog, but he is going to come with truckloads of lab work. Sometimes the research could be lethal: Anand faced it himself when Kasparov routed him with homework in a 1995 match. The Indian grandmaster is meticulous with his homework. At one point, he has even worked with Carlsen ahead of a match, so he knows how his opponent’s mind works.
Carlsen has trained under and practised with various people, including Kasparov, but typically not for long. He abruptly terminated the arrangement with Kasparov because he found the Russian’s coaching too stifling for his own style of playing. An intuitive player, Carlsen is known to dislike chess-playing programmes and the training camps that most world title challengers would go to ahead of a match.
Unlike other top players, Carlsen is known not to focus on the opening moves: he would only make sure that he doesn’t get into a horrible position early in the game. His real strength, say experts, is his ability to carve out wins even from sterile positions. But every now and then, his strength becomes his Achilles’ heel: Carlsen is known to overreach and sometimes, ends up losing. He said in a recent interview that he makes mistakes in every game. Just that his opponents aren’t smart enough to seize the opportunity.
Playing before a home crowd in a World Championship final for the first time, Anand will come with his best preparation ever and unless he collapses under performance anxiety, he is not going to go down without a fight.
It may not be as easy for Carlsen as one would think looking at the bookmakers’ odds on this match.
■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
ANAND AT A GLANCE
Born 11 December 1969
Age 6 : His mother taught him to play chess. He soon moved with his family to the Philippines for a year where he honed his chess skills solving problems on a TV show.
Age 14: Anand won the National Sub-Junior (Under-15) Chess Championship in 1983, his first major tournament victory, winning all nine games, playing at “lightening speed”. This marked the beginning of undisputed dominance of players from Tamil Nadu in Indian chess tournaments.
Age 16 : Anand first became India’s champion. He won the Indian national championship at least twice more on the trot, but soon gave up playing in India.
Age 18 : Won the World Junior Chess Championship in September 1987 and became a grandmaster, India’s first, in 1988.
1992 : Anand won the Reggio Emilia tournament in Italy, which, at that time, was the most competitive event going by the strength of the players who took part. In his first major victory in an international by-invitation-only tournament, Anand was ahead of former world champions Anatoly Karpov and Garry Kasparov.
1993: Anand entered the world championship qualifiers—in his first outing he lost to Karpov.
1994-95: Suffered two defeats, first to American Gata Kamsky in a world championship qualifier held in India. Then, in a little over a year, he lost a world title match to Kasparov. In both matches, Anand seized early lead.
1998: This was the closest Anand got to the world title till then, but because playing conditions favoured his opponent Karpov, he lost in tiebreakers from a commanding position.
2000: Launching his campaign for the world title with an event in India, he won a knock-out tournament in Delhi, and followed it with a crushing victory over Alexei Shirov in Tehran to claim the elusive crown. He held the title till 2002, regained it in 2007 and has defended it since .
April 2007-September 2008: Anand held pole position in the rating table for 15 months, first from April to December 2007, and then from April to September 2008, his rating peaking at 2,803 during this period. He was the world’s top rated player for seven more months—three in 2010 and four in 2011, but slipped behind Carlsen since.
ANAND’S REIGN
2000: After losing two world chess championship finals in 1995 and 1998 against Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov, respectively, Viswanathan Anand won the world title for the first time in December, beating defending champion Alexander Khalifman of Russia and co-finalist Alexei Shirov in a knockout tournament followed by a four-game match held in Delhi and Tehran.
2007: Anand won an eight-player double round-robin tournament in Mexico in September to claim the world title from Vladimir Kramnik of Russia, scoring 9 out of 14. He has since remained the world champion, successfully defending his title thrice.
2008: Anand beat Kramnik 6.5-4.5 to retain his title in a 12-game match held in Germany in October. Anand seized the lead in the third game—the first two ended in draws—and got to the winning score with one game to spare. Anand beat Kramnik thrice in the match; Kramnik pulled one back; the rest were drawn.
2010: Anand beat Veselin Topalov of Bulgaria 6.5-4.5 in another 12-game match held in May. Because of volcanic ash emissions in Iceland, Anand couldn’t fly to the Bulgarian capital of Sofia in time for the match. He eventually reached Sofia travelling from Frankfurt by road for 40 hours.
2012: The Indian beat Boris Gelfand of Israel in May in a 12-game match held in Moscow. The scores were level at the end of 12 games—both players won one game each, and the rest were drawn. Anand won in the rapid-fire tiebreakers, winning one of the four games.
■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
CARLSEN AT A GLANCE
Born 30 November 1990 at Tønsberg in southern Norway
Age 5: Learned to play chess from father Henrik Carlsen
Age 8: Played in the first tournament in Norway
Age 13: Held former world champion Garry Kasparov to a draw and beat another former world No.1 Anatoly Karpov in shorter variants of the game
Age 13: Became a grandmaster in April 2004. At that time, the second youngest to achieve that title
Age 18: In November 2009, entered the elite 2,800 points rating club, has never fallen below that level since
Age 19: Became the highest rated among active players in January 2010—the youngest ever to claim the top spot
Age 22: Surpassed former world champion Kasparov’s record rating of 2,851 in January this year, beating it by 10 points, after almost 14 years
2 years, 4 months: Time taken by Carlsen to go from 2,700 to 2,801: during this period (July 2007-November 2009) the average rating of the world’s top 100 players went from 2,671 to 2,688
29: Number of times he has been the highest rated player in the world—a record
$3.5 million (Rs.21.7 crore): Estimated income in 2013 from endorsement contracts and winnings at chess, according to Norwegian newspapers.
■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
ANAND VS CARLSEN IN RATINGS
2010: In January, Carlsen became the highest rated among active players for the first time, with a rating of 2,810. Anand was third with 2,790 points. Carlsen slipped to No.2 behind Anand in November. Anand, with 2804, was two points ahead of Carlsen.
2011: In January, Carlsen regained the top spot with 2,814 points, nudging past Anand in second place with 2,810. Anand overtook Carlsen again in March by gaining three points over his January rating, but the Danish grandmaster reclaimed the top spot in July, while Anand took a short break from tournaments. Carlsen has since held pole position on the rating table.
2012: Carlsen gained 13 points during the year from 59 games, taking his rating from 2,835 in January to 2,848 in December. Anand fell behind, his rating going down from 2,799 to 2,775 during the year—a loss of 24 points from 43 games. He went down from fourth to the sixth spot among active players.
2013: From January to November, Carlsen has gained 9 rating points to reach 2,870. In February, his rating peaked at 2,872 points—the highest ever by anyone. Anand has only gained three points in 11 months. His current rating of 2,775 is 42 points south of his career best 2,817 in March 2011.
HEAD-TO-HEAD: ANAND-CARLSEN
29: Total games played
6: Anand has won
3: Carlsen has won
20: Were drawn
■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■ ■
CHENNAI ON A HIGH
Rs. 29 crore: The budget for the match: most of the money is coming from the Tamil Nadu government. Other sponsors such as Indian Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, Tamil Nadu Newsprint and Papers Ltd , are paying Rs.50 lakh each.
Rs. 16 crore: Or around $2.6 million is the the total prize fund, of which the winner gets 60% and a 15-sovereign gold medal. The loser gets 40% of the cash prize and a 10-sovereign silver medal.
Rs. 70 lakh: The amount spent on building the playing arena—a 35ft long, 15ft wide, 11ft high sound proof glass enclosure. Temperature will be maintained at 23 degrees Celsius, and the playing area will be illuminated with 800 lumen white cool light.
Rs. 2,000: The minimum price of a daily ticket (it’s Rs.500 for a season ticket for Sachin Tendulkar’s 199th Test match at Eden Gardens that started on Wednesday). The 435 sq. m hall where the match is to be played can seat up to 350. Seven corporate boxes are priced at
Rs.35,000 each. Schoolchildren can attend for free.
Arundhati Ramanathan
Odds
Carlsen: 2/7
Anand: 5/2
Note: Person betting on Carlsen will earn £2 (around Rs.200) for £7 wagered if he wins, compared to £5 for £2 staked on an Anand win. This shows bookmakers see Carlsen as clear favourite.
The winner will get Nakamura.