Here are the standings at the midway mark. What have been the biggest surprises for you so far?
1-2. GM Magnus Carlsen (Norway 2690), GM Viswanathan Anand (India 2779) 4.5
3. GM Vassily Ivanchuk (Ukraine 2750) 4.0
4-5. GM Peter Svidler (Russia 2728), GM Levon Aronian (Armenia 2744) 3.5
6-7. GM Peter Leko (Hungary 2749), GM Veselin Topalov (Bulgaria 2783) 3.0
8. GM Alexander Morozevich (Russia 2741) 2.0
Magnus leading the tournament with Anand? Ivanchuk in clear third as the last minute sub? Leko and Topalov at -1? Svidler not winning a single game? Aronian at even score? Morozevich in last place?
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
Carlsen. I am a big fan, but I did not expect him to:
– Get 3 wins in the first half against the world’s elite
– Beat Topalov (even if it was a drawn position)
– Be sharing 1st place after 7 games
Great showing by the 16-year-old.
Carlsen’s and Topalov’s standings at the half way stage are surely the most suprising things..in fact going by statistics it should have been other way around. Anand is back! Funny cycle: chucky beats aronian beats anand beats carlsen beats chucky! Lol 😉
Asim
ofcourse Topalov, this is not the right place for him
Carlsen’s position at the top since you would have expected diverently after his poor showing at Wijk aan Zee.
Carlsen at the top is a surprise. The scoffers were out in force after Corus and Tal Memorial, but he seems to be getting over the jitters of playing with the big dogs.
The biggest surprise for me was that Topalov was able to win against Morozevich.
I expected Carlsen to bounce back from his bad Corus performance, but that he won 3 games is also a surprise.
Leko surprised me a little, I thought he and Peter Svidler would have 7 draws in Morelia.
Aronian surprised a little by having a relatively bad tournament.
Only Anand did not surprise me.
The biggest surprise is Topalov being at -1 and not -2 or -3 in such a strong tournament.
Yes it’s strange that the world number 1 and joint winner of the even stronger Corus tournament isn’t doing even worse.
These stupid comments are getting more pathetic and annoying every day.
OOOOH
I don’t know. I kind of enjoyed the comment. got a laugh out of it. I had to laugh because it is so sad and so true.
We have to wait to the end of the tourney to see what is funny. At least we are sure Kramnik is not going to win:) well this is funny.
“Yes it’s strange that the world number 1 and joint winner of the even stronger Corus tournament isn’t doing even worse.
These stupid comments are getting more pathetic and annoying every day.”
They sure are. Thanks for confessing. The average rating in Morelia is 2745. The average rating at Corus was 2717. In what possible sense was Corus stronger?
Topalov is playing pretty poorly here. He is lucky not to be -2 or -3. He only won yesterday because Moro played even worse.
the biggest surprise to me is carlsen/anand’s second place half-way through the tournament. shows that vishy is back and magnus is doing great. of course, kramnik is first by default, no matter if he participates or not.
“Topalov is playing pretty poorly here. He is lucky not to be -2 or -3. He only won yesterday because Moro played even worse.”
perhaps you’re right and topalov is lucky to have one win. perhaps you are an imbecile. perhaps you were lucky to overcome the word verification hurdle and be able to post to this blog and enlighten us with your opinion.
>>
“In what possible sense was Corus stronger”
The average was lower?
Did you notice that there were around 14 at corus whereas there are only 8 here?
It is harder to keep so high an average with more players, as not all players are that good.
More opponents makes it harder.
Kramnik and Radjabov and Karjakin make it harder.
Maybe you should learn a little about chess and also about statistics before you quote one statistic to make a point about a chess tournament. Everything is not so simple in reality as it is to you.
dude, everyone is flaming. I suggest you all sit back, take a deep breath, and maybe lay off the personal attacks. Everyone is entitled to their opinions.
“perhaps you’re right and topalov is lucky to have one win. perhaps you are an imbecile. perhaps you were lucky to overcome the word verification hurdle and be able to post to this blog and enlighten us with your opinion.”
The definition of stupidity is catching you in a careless error. LOL. I’m not quite sure you know what that word means.
It would have been easier and quicker to write “I made a mistake, Morelia is stronger”, but I guess you’re not big enough for that.
So, its harder to play one game against Anand and one against Karjakin than to play two against Anand? Nah, Morelia is hared than Corus!
“
Maybe you should learn a little about chess and also about statistics before you quote one statistic to make a point about a chess tournament.
“
The previous guy just stated some facts (the av rating) and asked a question. Some answer he got 🙂
Carlsen’s result is the most surprising. Topalov has good tournaments and bad ones, but Magnus has never sustained this kind of result against the big boys. Be interesting to see if he can keep it up when the tournament resumes.
CHUCKY!!!!
1.Veselin Topalov
2.Viswanathan Anand
3.Vladimir Kramnik
4.Peter Svidler
5.Levon Aronian
6.Teimour Radjabov
7.David Navara
8.Alexey Shirov
9.Ruslan Ponomariov
10.Magnus Carlsen
11.Sergei Tiviakov
12.Loek van Wely
13.Sergey Karjakin
14.Alexander Motylev
Are 14 not 13 players from Corus
Who are the 6 players whose scores aren’t mentioned on this post for Linares?
The really big surprise here is of course Carlsen, the lowest seed and 16y old in the joint lead after 7 rounds!
Ivanchuk ahead of Aronian is also a surprise, very well done by the sub! Topalov at -1 is _not_ a surprise. *lol*
>>The previous guy just stated some facts (the av rating) and asked a question. Some answer he got 🙂 >>
Facts are okay, but these comments are generally disrespectful and hateful remarks against Topalov and they should not be tolerated.
Yes people are entitled to opinions, but do we want to hear worthless, jealous, hate filled ones about Topalov’s ability?
How about a comment about how great it is for Carlsen, or how nice it is to see Anand winning?
Linares is a Cat 20 event, Corus was a Cat 19 event.
No point in arguing which is tourney is stronger, Linares is by a far margin stronger.
What does cat 20 mean?
How can you use Elo rating average in arguing that Topalov is a bad player?
YATF missing the joke?
Last year Linares, Topa had -2 at this point of the tourney… so -1 for him is good! 🙂
—
*YATF = Yet Another Topa Fan
Carlsen beating Ivanchuk is the surprise of the tournament. More than a surprise, it is an injustice. If that game was a draw, the two best players: Ivanchuk and Anand would have been co-leading the tournament right now.
My prediction: Ivanchuk and Anand co-winning the Linares (assuming no tie-break principles are applied).
Rgds M.
“Facts are okay, but these comments are generally disrespectful and hateful remarks against Topalov and they should not be tolerated.
Yes people are entitled to opinions, but do we want to hear worthless, jealous, hate filled ones about Topalov’s ability?”
Did you actually read what was written, or did the old knee just jerk? All he said was that Topalov wasn’t playing very well and might easily be doing worse. That’s not a hateful comment except to the most devoted groupie. Topalov’s a chess player, not a religion.
“What does cat 20 mean?”
Average rating between 2726 and 2750. Category 19 is 2701-2725 average.
“
The definition of stupidity is catching you in a careless error. LOL. I’m not quite sure you know what that word means.
It would have been easier and quicker to write “I made a mistake, Morelia is stronger”, but I guess you’re not big enough for that. “
What a stupid comment!
” Linares is a Cat 20 event, Corus was a Cat 19 event.
No point in arguing which is tourney is stronger, Linares is by a far margin stronger. “
another stupid comment!
” The biggest surprise is Topalov being at -1 and not -2 or -3 in such a strong tournament. “
really stupid comment
“
Like if we didn’t have enough scandals in chess…
The live transmission of the Stan Novikov’s games was stopped after a group of GMs complained. It turned out that most of the Novikov’s moves exactly matched the first line of Fritz. Also his time management was extremely strange for a human player- 2-3 minute per move (never more or less than that!).
After the live transmission was stopped, S.Novikov
scored .5 out of 3 remaining games. Go figure…”
Unfortunately, Morozevich’s bad standing is only a small surprise.
Except in San Luis, he has often struggled to reach below-par results against the very top.
The most obvious deduction from Novikov’s results in the last three rounds is that being accused groundlessly of cheating is upsetting and tends to make players play more weakly.
Percy
>>another stupid comment! >>
Do you know what those words mean? You tend to use them as though they meant “this is something that may be true, but which I don’t want to hear”, but they actually mean something quite different.
If you can’t find any fault in something, you should assume that there was none to find. Cause if it is there and you keep missing it, that seems really stupid.
is Carlsen standing… and Morozevich last place!
Hi,
Topalov and Carlsen performances.
Regards
Pony
Novikov challenged each of his 4 accusers to a 4 game match on chesspro forums! The only controversy is that he wants an even score to be treated “in favor of a lower-rated player” (that is, him). If he can let go of this point, we shall see some exciting chess!
Yes thats a good way to prove youre not cheating… Topalov should challenge some GM to blitz game in a sealed room.
jgdtzThe biggest surprise was not Carlsen’s success it was the 1 win of topalov i was waiting that he can not win any single game but moro really played bad, and it seems topalov is not 2500 as i think i give him now 2650 rating sorry topi fans :DDDD but never 2800 he is a cheater everyone knows this and topalov tragedy will continue in Linares part of tournament, if he wins any game you can call him oleyyyy but i am not sure that he can do it!!!
Please post the names of the 4
accusers of S. Novikov.
Nic.
ON 26.02 Novikov posted a challenge on chesspro. he challengedthe following 4:
Nepomniashchiy
Belov
Korotyliov
Ryazantsev
Until today he disappeared from the forums.
Almost immediately ‘chemodan’ offered himself as organizer and sponsor for one of the matches. Also, Belov (and Ryazantsev as I understood) voiced their agreement to play. Last day forum was milling the rumors that it was not Novikov who posted this since there was no reaction from him. however last post by chemodan on chesspro says Novikov contacted him by phone.
There is a chance some of the matches will be organized.