White is Kramnik. Black is Bareev. This is their round 6 game at the 2005 Russian Championship. White made a number of bad moves to reach an inferior position from a superior position. However, it is still very hard for Black to make things happen here.
In this position, Kramnik decided to give his opponent a Holiday gift by playing 38. Ra2?? Rxa5 39. Rxa5 Qxf2+ 40. Kh1hxg3 41. Qg1 g2+ 42. Kh2 Qf4+ 43. Kxg2 Qd2+ 44. Kg3 Qxa5 45. Qe3 Qc7+ 46. Kg2 Qd6 0-1 
Chess Daily News from Susan Polgar
GM Kramnik needs a break.
Kramnik has been on a break for a long time. he needs to get back to work.
Vinay said…
GM Kramnik needs a break.
11:57 AM
I say:
GM Kramnik needs to win some games.
His performance is terrible. In fact it is not terrible it is a disgrace. the entire world except for a few diehards are going to abandon Kramnik as having any legitimate claim to a world championship any longer if he does not get his act together immediately.
Kramnik has been losing rating points in his chess for a couple of years now. and he is losing more in this tournament.
Actually too bad Topalov did not agree to play him. Topalov would blow Kramnik off the chess board right now.
I am not a Kramnik fan but I am very disappointed in him. He makes big claims and it would be nice if he could win some good games against some players.
This is the typical Russian style, making big bogus claims: Kramnik and Kosteniuk. One wants to be a world champion forever and one pretends to be a 3-time world champion when she didn’t even a single world championship. She also pretends to be higher rated than Judit Polgar. What a joke!
MSA: 12470226 JUDITH POLGAR 2648
Alexandra’s Rankings
Current FIDE: GM 2516 ELO
Current World Rank: 5th woman
Current USA Rank:1st woman
Current USA Rating: USCF 2565
Current Rus. Rank: 1st woman
What a bold face liar.
What is the correct move instead of Ra2?
Why “Brissago” again ? Is it fair ? Is it grace or dignity against a player who has just loose a hard fought game ? Everybody make mistakes so please let us fair …
It’s absolutely fair. I like the title.
Give me a break about Kramnik. He is playing worst and worst. In a must win tournament to give his title any credibility, he is performing 91 points below his rating after 6 rounds. Stop with the Kramnik nonsense. He’s no World Champion anymore. Soon he’ll be below 2700. It’s a disgrace.
Kramnik is a guy with big claim but can’t back it up in a the last few years. Time for Topalov and Carlsen. No more whiny Kramnik. Just shut up and go away.
I like to think of it as Kramnik continuing to shed his reputation for unsightly drawing percentages. His drawing % this year is actually below the average among top GM’s, and he’s only drawn 33% so far this tourney. Of course, the other 67% are not all wins….
91 points below?? That would put him in the same class as Rublevsky, Jakovenko and Zvjaginsev. Except, all are ahead of him in the standings so far.
Kramnik came into the tournament with a 2739 elo. he once had over 2800 when he defeated Kasparov or close to that time.
in this tournament so far his performance rating is 91 points below his elo. so although he is even on points. 3 points out of 6 games. His performance is terrible. when we factor in the fact that he knows he has to perform to get a title match with topalov, it does not look good at all for kramnik.
Draw In Three said…
What is the correct move instead of Ra2?
5:51 PM
Well his rook has just been attacked by blacks queen so a simple thing is to move the rook out of the way. but he must protect f2. that would not be good if black gets Qxf2 check and the king loses protection.
so good moves might be either Rd2 or Rb2. the problem with Ra2 is that Rxa5 looks to draw the rook away from f2. although white could have played Qb2 to maintain protection of f2.
So Kramnik actually made a 2nd error after the first error. he should have played Qb2 instead of RxR.
Absolutely I dont think Kramnik is playing like the World Chess Champion that I would want to support. Topalov is playing very well. WAZ will have both Kramnik and Topalov in January. that will be a super interesting tournament.
re : brissago effect
Hi Susan! you played in world championship matches…i imagine it is tough after preparing for one opponent, the emotional stress of playing a championship etc. etc. (we saw the same thing with leko and kasparov in 2000 for some recent examples) but how long does it take to recover? i personally hope to see kramnik play at the level of the late 90s, but day after day i find it harder to believe he will
Recovery time would be a few weeks to a month. I can even understand 2 months or three. Six months to a year is just an excuse.
Best wishes,
Susan Polgar
http://www.PolgarChess.com
http://www.SusanPolgar.com