Anand – Kramnik

Ronan Bennett and Daniel King
The Guardian,
Monday October 6 2008

In just over a week’s time, Viswanathan Anand, from India, and Vladimir Kramnik, from Russia, will do battle at the Art and Exhibition Hall of the Federal Republic of Germany in Bonn for the title of world chess champion.

Two players slugging it out over a series of games remains, for me, the greatest spectacle in chess and the only fitting way to decide the world title. Thankfully, Fide (the international chess federation) has seen sense and returned to tradition after experimenting with other formats. Mind you, this time there will be only 12 games – the longer matches of the past are out of favour with sponsors, organisers and media.

This match brings together the two champions of the parallel world titles and should settle their competing claims. Following his victory in the world championship tournament last year, Anand is the official champion (Kramnik came second), but Kramnik has declared that the title should be decided by a two-player match. And that is a format in which Anand has yet to prove himself. Kramnik, on the other hand, while less consistent than Anand in tournament play, has focused his energy on his classical world championship matches. In 2000 he defeated Kasparov, in 2004 he drew with Leko, and in 2006 he defeated Topalov.

Both players have a classical strategic style, but Anand plays far more fluently and quickly than Kramnik. That can lead to dazzling and seemingly effortless victories, but there is a flip side: the Indian is sometimes prone to impulsiveness. And that’s something that could ignite this match. There will no doubt be a few games where home analysis results in correct and possibly dull draws, but I am hoping that the occasionally random nature of Anand’s play will be the grit that produces pearls…

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2008/oct/06/chess