One of India’s greatest sportsmen

The right moves
Devangshu Datta / New Delhi
October 19, 2008, 0:36 IST

Viswanathan Anand’s recent win cannot be sidelined. Not yet.

On Friday evening, one of India’s greatest sportsmen moved one crucial step forward in a bid to reaffirm that he is the best at what he does. His feat was blotted out of public consciousness because it coincided with Sachin Tendulkar easing ahead of Brian Lara.

Viswanathan Anand’s win in the third game of his 12-game world chess championship match in Bonn was actually a bigger sporting achievement than Tendulkar’s 88 at Mohali. It came on a larger stage, under more pressure, with far more at stake.

Anand is a world champion at a sport played by millions across 160 nations; he is defending the title he won in 2007, against Vladimir Kramnik of Russia, with €1.5 million on the side as prize money, and an immeasurable amount of prestige at stake.

A win in one game, of course, doesn’t guarantee Anand will keep the title with nine games to play. Kramnik is known for good nerves. But the win does put the Indian Grandmaster in front.

Drawing parallels between a great performer in a team sport and a great performer in an individual sport is invidious. But in this case, it’s irresistible because of the concatenation of age and circumstances.

Like Tendulkar, the soft-spoken 38-year-old from Chennai is into his third decade as a world class performer. He won his first big title, the World Junior Championship, as a 17-year-old in 1987, two years before the slightly younger Mumbaikar arrived on the international stage.

Anand is far less well known than SRT in his homeland. But he’s far more likely to be asked for an autograph in Eastern Europe or Latin America. Since the early 1990s, he has been consistently among the top three. He has been voted player of the year five times by his peers.

Endorsements and IPL apart, he routinely earns more in prize money and appearance fees than the entire Indian cricket team combined.

Anand has been world champion twice. The first time, he was not undisputed champion because of a long-standing schism in chess. The second time, there was no dispute but the format was universally reckoned unsatisfactory, even by Anand. If he wins at Bonn, he will have reaffirmed his right to hold a 122-year-old title and achieved the incredible feat of winning it thrice under different formats.

Chess is a gladiatorial sport, often described as mental boxing. Two people slug it out, toe to toe, trying to beat each other up psychologically. The title is ideally traded in match play — more convincing than tournaments, which can be won by beating tail-enders.

A challenger qualifies by winning one-on-one matches against other wannabe contenders to play an extended set of games against the champion, who has himself reached the top via the same process. Matches are won by the player more adept at decoding the opponent’s style and more capable of holding their nerves at crunch moments.

The sport is administered by the World Chess Federation (Federacion Internationale De’ Echecs or Fide). In 1993, reigning champion Garry Kasparov walked out. Over the next 12 years, Kasparov remained no:1 on the ratings but refused to play in Fide contests. In 2000, Anand won the Fide title contest even as Kasparov suffered defeat in match-play to Kramnik and conceded his “title”. As a result there were two “champions”, a situation boxing fans will find familiar.

In 2005, after Kasparov retired, Fide made energetic attempts to reunify the title. Veselin Topalov won a world title tournament marred by Kramnik’s refusal to participate. In 2007, Kramnik agreed to play a title tournament in Mexico along with Anand and four other modern greats. Kramnik’s pound of flesh was a world championship match in case he did not win at Mexico. Anand won Mexico and became champion. Bonn is that promised title match.

Kramnik along with Kasparov and Anand is part of a small coterie that dominated for 15 years, with occasional bursts of brilliance from Topalov. Anand and Kramnik know each other well. They have played over 100 games against each other in various formats.

So far, the reality of Bonn has lived up to the promise with very high-quality, exciting play. On the basis of the first three games, Anand’s preparation appears slightly superior. He leads 1-0, and he has made more of the running.

Anand’s contribution to Indian chess goes a long way beyond being one genius in an ocean of mediocrity. His feats have inspired two entire generations. A horde of young boys and girls now have the confidence to take the world on, on their own terms. At the moment, three of the four most prestigious titles in chess are held by Indians.

The world junior champion is Indian, so is the world under-20 girls’ champion. There are two more Indians in the top 50 and dozens of teenaged prodigies. The talent pipeline started with Anand. It will not dry up after he retires. That will perhaps be his most enduring legacy apart from the wonderful games he has produced over the years.

Source: http://www.business-standard.com