The FIDE Presidential Board has confirmed that Chennai, India, will serve as the venue for the World Chess Champion-ship match between defending champion Viswanathan Anand and the highest ranked player in the world, Magnus Carlsen, from November 6 to November 26, 2013. Chennai is the home town of Anand.
Carlsen and the Norwegian Chess Federation lodged a protest in relation to the venue. A statement issued by Carlsen read in part: “I’m deeply disappointed and surprised by the FIDE decision to sign a contract for the 2013 match without going through the bidding process outlined in the WC regulations and not choosing neutral ground.”
Notwithstanding this circumstance, Carlsen has indicated his intention to compete in the match and his team of assistants have begun preparations for the November encounter.
Anand has defended his title successfully since 2008 against Vladimir Kramnik, Veselin Topalov and Boris Gelfand. Kramnik had toppled Garry Kasparov in 2000 in London for the title. Anand feels that Carlsen is going to present a number of difficulties for him. During interviews with the Indian press, Anand has admitted that Carlsen will be a very tough challenger although he leads the statistics of games the two have played against each other.
The Norwegian is regarded as the favourite for the match. One of Europe’s biggest bookmakers has given him a 66 per cent chance of winning the title. Since Carlsen achieved the highest ELO rating ever, surpassing Kasparov’s magic 2851 which was the benchmark for high numbers in rating history, Anand has never taken a game from him.
Chess has a tradition of the champion taking on the challenger directly in the title clash without having to negotiate earlier rounds or a qualifying tournament. Anand remarked: “It’s a wonderful privilege, I’m not denying it. In a sense, I earned it by winning it in Mexico and then defending it a few times.” Carlsen, on the other hand, has a different view.
He noted: “In my opinion privileges should in general be abolished and a future world championship model should be based on a fair fight between the best players in the world, on equal terms. This should apply also to the winner of the previous world championship, and especially so when there are several players at approximately the same level in the world elite. Why should one player have one of two tickets to the final to the detriment of all remaining players in the world? Imagine that the winner of the 2010 Football World Cup would be directly qualified to the 2014 World Cup final, while the rest of the teams would have to fight for the other spot?”
During an interest-ing interview published recently, Vladimir Kramnik, the world number 3, says he is backing Anand to win the match. But to do so, Anand must play his natural game and cease to be intimidated by his younger opponent. Carlsen is 22 and Anand is 43. Kramnik contends that Anand is still good enough, and he loses very rarely. He is match oriented and is not wasting time on regular tournaments. Kramnik argued that one does not have to win many games in a match. It is enough to win one game and draw the rest. Carlsen’s age and the boundless energy of youth, however, would be a decisive advantage during the match.
Meanwhile, Guyana participated in the Heroes Day Chess Festival two weekends ago in Barbados. Guyana’s entries were national champion Taffin Khan and Anthony Drayton. Both entrants accumulated 5.5 points with the top score coming from Jamaica with 7.5 points.
