Both Alekseev (against Ismagambetov) and Ponomariov (against El Gindy) survived losses in the 1st game to win in the playoff by the score of 2.5 – 1.5 to advance to the 2nd round of the World Cup. Akopian survived draws in the first 2 games (against Filippov) to win by the same score in the playoff.
But Nigel Short was not so lucky. After drawing his first 2 games, he lost game 3 and drew game 4 against young Baramidze of Germany as was eliminated. I do not have the full results yet but I believe that he may be among the top 5 highest seeds to be eliminated so far.
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
Not fair to Short. He’s old and out of shape. He should pick on someone his own size like Kamsky.
Sutovsky, Eljanov, and Landa are three higher seeds than Short that have been eliminated.
Harikrishna is another higher seed than Short who was knocked out.
I hope this is rated. I want to see Ivanchuk break 2840. Terrible that he couldn’t play in the last candidates matches.
No sympathy for Short.
We should remember that he is the responsible guy for not having a proper World Chess Championship cycle since 1993!!!
I’m glad he is out.
Congratulations to Baramidze; well done.
Ivanchuk break 2840 ??
He lost a lot of points lately in the EC and the memorial Tal.
“Nigel Short knocked out”
The first thing I thought of was Rustam Kamsky.